Compromised
by bravevulnerability
Summary: 'Kate Beckett may have slid beneath his skin, threaded herself through his veins and leaked into his bloodstream, but maybe it was a good thing, for now, for the sake of the mission. He'd have her out of his system by the time it was all over with.' A roughly season 8 inspired AU.
1. Chapter 1

_"It is both of us that will keep each other safe._

 _We save each other."_

 _-Tyler Knott Gregson_

* * *

"Kate Beckett, 35 years old, captain of the Twelfth precinct. Mother, Johanna Beckett, was murdered in January of '99, the daughter's been obsessed with avenging her death ever since."

Castle observes the woman on the white-board in front of him, listening to the man speaking as if giving a lecture in a college auditorium, but having to focus harder than usual. Kate Beckett is stunning.

"And did she? Avenge her mother's death?" he inquires, following one of the lines that flow like a spider web to the crime scene photo of Johanna Beckett, crumpled and smeared with blood in an alleyway.

The man nods. "Last year, despite the efforts of sources I'm not permitted to speak of, Detective Beckett discovered evidence that put Senator William Bracken away for life."

"Good, always hated that guy," Castle mutters, earning an exasperated look from the man briefing him, but he merely shrugs in reply.

Gorgeous and efficient, he was going to have fun with this one.

"Anyway. Once Bracken was put away, the former detective threw all of her time and energy into becoming captain of the Twelfth precinct and posed no form of threat to us. Until recently." Castle follows the makeshift pointer of the man's marker down another thread. "Two years ago, when Captain Beckett had undergone a brief stint working for the Attorney General's office in Washington DC, she initiated a search connected to Bracken. Three days ago, something on that search popped, had her entire team killed."

Rick's face remains a blank slate, but internally, he winces. _An entire team?_

"And now?"

"And now, Kate Beckett is going to hunt this thing until she finds the truth, or it kills her." The man shrugs, withdraws his marker to his side. "We have reached out to you, Agent Castle, to simply draw the captain away."

"And if I don't, you'll kill her?" Rick challenges, crossing his arms, tilting his head with the question.

The other man straightens in front of him, not a trace of nonsense hiding in the hard lines of his expression.

"We have had our eyes on Kate Beckett for years. Multiple times she has proven that she is not one to underestimate. Once she exposed Bracken, claimed her long sought after victory, we assumed she would be content."

"You were wrong?" Castle murmurs, arching his eyebrow at the man who looks far from amused.

"Unfortunately. Believe it or not, Agent, we do our best to keep our hands clean in this business. Disposing of Captain Beckett is a task we would rather not pursue. At the moment."

"So you reach out to my father, recruit me to do the dirty work for you?" Rick queries, still irritated with that, with how his father could simply decide to loan him to this ominous underground company without consulting him.

"The CIA prefers to have more friends than enemies, son. Consider this a peace treaty of sorts," Hunt had joked with him, always turning everything into a joke since Rick had been a child. He had never been amused by his father's humor.

"The objective is simple. All we are asking of you is to lure Kate Beckett away from this, gain her trust and… _distract_ her, with your company, ensure that she never learns the truth. The timetable on this situation is sensitive but negotiable, though if you cannot complete the task, if it proves too difficult due to Beckett's obstinate nature, then you contact us. As I said, we don't like to get our hands dirty, but we are more than capable."

Rick glances back to the photo of the woman placed in the middle of the board, the image of what could become of her, her face pale and lifeless, her skin stained in blood, flashing behind his eyes one that makes his stomach twist without permission, and he stands from the seat he had taken in their conference room.

He'd had no intention of taking this job when he had walked into the facility two hours ago, determined to turn them down just to spite his father, but now he steps forward, snags the file from the table as he heads for the door.

"It's a deal."

* * *

Kate absentmindedly traces the rim of her glass, chasing drops of condensation with the tip of her nail while the man across from her continues on with talk of his most recent endeavor with a burning building. He's nearing the ending of how had heroically saved a family of four from a flaming Brownstone and had even gone back for the beloved pet dog. By no means did she find the fireman's job anything less than admirable and she had been completely intrigued by his detailed recounting. The first time around.

Seven stories later and she had completely lost interest, in both the conversation and the man.

Her date is an absolute bore and she is _so_ tempted to escape to the bathroom, call Lanie and simultaneously complain while seeking a chance of rescue from Brad the firefighter, whom her best friend had set her up with.

A loud ringing startles her from her leisurely study of her wine and she glances up to see Brad jerking his cellphone from his front pocket.

"Oh, Kate, I'm so sorry. I'm off for the night, but I told the station to call if necessary-"

"No apology needed, Brad. Go save some more lives," Kate encourages with a strained smile that the fearless fireman seems to accept as genuine.

"Will do! Maybe we can meet again later this week?" her fleeing date asks as he shrugs his jacket back on and pushes up from his chair.

"I'll call you," she promises, lies, and Brad throws her another dazzling smile that is too bright for her tired eyes.

"Fantastic, look forward to hearing from you," he beams, leaning forward to peck her on the cheek before darting for the exit, and Kate sighs in relief.

She had wanted a break from the monotony of her work schedule, confiding in Lanie that she had wanted _loud_ because her life was far too quiet, but Brad the fireman has successfully reminded her why she isn't suited for noise.

Kate sighs, unsure if she's more disappointed with the direction this evening took or simply herself, and pops open the compact purse at her side. She's just about to pull out her phone, send a text to Lanie and see if her friend would like to join her for drinks at the bar a couple of blocks away, but she's barely parted the mouth of her clutch when someone is sliding in across from her.

"Glad he's finally gone," the stranger chuckles, settling into Brad's former seat and quirking his brow at her while Kate considers whether or not she'll be in need of the pepper spray, or even the gun, she has tucked into her purse.

"Excuse me?" she replies, scrutinizing the unwelcome man in front of her, trailing her gaze from the bronze of his hair to the piercing blues of his eyes, the distinct angles of his jaw, down the visible tendons of his neck to the broad wall of his chest, his shoulders…

Well, maybe not _completely_ unwelcome.

"Oh, the guy who was boring you to death," he answers, hooking his thumb over his shoulder in the direction Brad had sauntered off in. "I hadn't wanted to be rude, but I thought he'd never leave-"

"How can you just assume I was bored? Were you listening in on my conversation with my date?" she demands, pinning the handsome man across from her with one of her best interrogation glares, but he only smirks back at her in response.

"Okay, first of all, I'm Rick," he begins, folding his hands atop the white tablecloth. "And I saw you when you walked in half an hour ago. Couldn't really take my eyes off of you."

"And you think that gave you the right to invite yourself to my table, Rick?"

His eyes flash at the sound of his name in her mouth, between her teeth.

"Of course not, I was just feeling brave," he shrugs, his smirk unfurling into a grin that's a little lopsided, imperfect but endearing nonetheless. "And no, I wasn't listening in on your conversation since I was sitting all the way over there," he informs her, nodding his head towards an empty table maybe twenty feet away, adorned with a single chair and a barely touched plate. "But I could see it was rather one sided and you were more intrigued by the drink in your hand. So, I'm assuming this was a blind date gone wrong?"

"Regardless of what it was, it's none of your business," she bites out, lifting her glass to her lips and taking a slow sip of the rich red wine, noticing those blue eyes following the line of her throat, a spark of gold bursting amidst the seas of cerulean. "Speaking of boring conversations, I think this one is over."

"Would I have a better chance if we had a different conversation?" he quips, quirking his brow at her, attaining the charm of a little boy for a moment, tempting her, but Kate shakes her head.

"No."

He deflates a little, just the slightest slump of his shoulders that she doubts anyone else would notice, but he doesn't stop smiling at her, even as he accepts his defeat.

"I understand, my sincerest apologies for bothering you," he states as he rises smoothly from Brad's chair, sweeping his eyes over her one last time before setting his shoulders back and turning towards the door. "Just know that the guy who was with you before was an idiot."

"Why do you say that?" she decides to indulge him, arching one of her eyebrows in question once he spares her another glance over his shoulder.

"From what I saw, he didn't stop talking from the second he arrived here to meet you. If I were him, the moment I saw you in that dress, I would have been speechless."

It's just another line, she reminds herself, a well-composed piece of flattery that any man could use as an attempt to win a woman over. But never had she heard a man use such words so earnestly.

Rick has already turned away from her, taking the same path Brad took towards the exit and disappearing out the doors, into the night, and Kate growls under her breath. She fishes out a few bills from the inside of her purse to leave a tip for the waiter, and stands from the table, strides out after the stupid man who had her too intrigued to just let him walk away. The first man who had successfully held her attention in such a long time.

"Hey," she calls, watching his spine stiffen in surprise before he spins around to see her stepping out of the restaurant, chasing after a stranger. "Rick."

"Yes?"

"Why were you dining alone in a five star restaurant?" she inquires, dodging an elegantly dressed couple walking past her for the door to Drago, and strutting towards him on the sidewalk.

"I know the owner. He owed me a free dinner and I had no plans for the evening," Rick answers without missing a beat, easing her nerves with the quick response. A man dining alone in a place like Drago, where the portions were small and the food was quite lackluster, she had begun to grow suspicious of his intentions. "I picked one hell of a night to dine on overly expensive cuisine."

Kate rolls her eyes. "Overly expensive and tiny."

"Oh, I know," he concedes. "I had the quail as a main course. Felt more like an appetizer."

"Brad and I didn't even make it past our appetizers, I'm starving," she reveals without thinking, regretting it the moment she notices the spark in his eyes reignite.

"It's still early, you know," he muses, shuffling his feet on the stained concrete beneath them, but curving his brow upwards, an interesting contradiction of uncertainty and confidence. "We could salvage the evening, have dinner somewhere that serves real food."

Something flutters in her stomach, the sensation almost foreign, and she immediately tampers it down, pins her bottom lip between her teeth and watches Rick's eyes subtly darken as they dart to her mouth.

"Did you have a place in mind?"

"Depends if you're in the mood for burgers or pizza," he answers, the smile on his face startling, the light in his eyes breathtaking, and there was no use trying to quiet the butterflies raging in her stomach now.

"Burgers," she decides, taking another step towards him, pursing her lips to stop the ridiculous returning smile threatening to bloom across her mouth when he holds his arm out to her.

"You're in luck, I have the perfect place in mind."

Kate curls her fingers into the crook of his elbow, feels the warmth spread from her fingertips, leaking into her bloodstream.

"Lead the way."

* * *

There were many ways to approach this, to approach her and the task at hand. Romancing her was the most effective from LokSat's perspective, abducting her would be his father's first choice, but Rick preferred to test the waters, to study his target, learn more about her before he made any concrete decisions.

Which led him into a bar and grill styled diner he had only been to once in the past, but could still remember the rich taste of a delicious burger and crisp fries on his taste buds. The same bar and grill he had tracked Kate Beckett to earlier in the week when his mission had begun.

Kate's lips part as he holds the door for her, delighted surprise subdued but shimmering in her eyes.

"What?" he asks, playing dumb, but his lips threaten to unfurl into a smile at the look on her face. He would bet his career that Kate Beckett failed to believe in fate, but he could see she was questioning the coincidence of his restaurant choice.

"Nothing," she murmurs with a quick shake of her head, the caramel locks of her hair shining in the soft light of the diner, falling around her face to graze along her cheeks. "Just an interesting choice."

"We could go somewhere else if you-"

"No, this is great," she assures him, walking alongside him towards a corner table near the back of the diner, where he can have a full view of the place. "Just not what I had expected."

"Better than Drago at least, right?" he jokes, sliding into the worn leather booth, flipping open his menu.

Kate chuckles, a light and beautiful sound, a rich contrast to the severity of her exterior. Every visible part of her is sharp, piercing and lethal from her head to her toes, but he's noticed over the last few days, when the line of her mouth curves upwards, when her eyes illuminate with amusement, the slashes of her cheekbones are softened, the frown lines bracketing her lips fade, and just a fraction of the intimidation she carries so well falls away.

"Definitely better than Drago."

"Better company too?"

Kate props her menu up in front of her, lifting her eyes to him over the top of the laminated sheets of paper, and hums thoughtfully as she pretends to peruse her dinner options.

"That's yet to be seen."

A young waitress approaches their table with a pen and notepad, scribbling down their orders and delivering two glasses of water while they await their burgers and the basket of fries Kate had suggested they share.

"You know, it would probably help if I knew your name," Castle muses, swirling his straw around in his glass, bumping ice cubes against the rim while Kate eyes him skeptically, always so suspicious. "Plus, you know mine, so sharing yours would only be fair-"

"Kate," she answers, scraping a hand through her hair, dislodging a couple of bobby pins to set the locks free around her shoulders. "Are we even now?"

Rick shrugs, trying so very hard not to be distracted by the spill of her hair over her bare shoulder, the caress of strands along the ridge of her collarbone, and since when did he look at a woman like an adolescent with his first crush?

"It'd be even better if I got to learn more about you."

Kate places her elbows on the tables, folds her hands beneath her chin, and studies him with an unnerving gaze that he's almost certain is an interrogation tactic.

"Okay, Rick," she decides, flicking her eyes to his mouth, back up to his gaze once more, and oh yeah, Kate Beckett knew exactly what she was doing, knew exactly how to make a man sweat. "But you first."

"I'm an open book," he lies, probably the greatest lie he could ever tell her, but Richard Castle's carefully constructed backstory would ring true. "So shoot."

He gives her the cover story he's rehearsed multiple times in the privacy of his loft, reciting the lines with ease, training his expressions to react in all the right ways at all the right times, and yet somehow, Kate Beckett still looks less than impressed by his tale of a struggling journalism career.

"Well, what about you?" he questions, a little offended that she doesn't approve of him. Well, his fake life, that is. He had worked on that story all week. "What do you do?"

"Captain of the Twelfth Precinct," she replies, pride simmering in her gaze, shifting to polite gratitude when the waitress appears with their meals.

"Impressive," Castle praises, sending a murmur of appreciation to their waitress and plucking a fry from the basket between them. "Interesting, though."

Kate pauses with her burger in her hands, barely even lifted from the surface of her plate, and narrows her gaze on him.

"Why is that?"

Castle shrugs, pops the fry into his mouth and makes her wait as he takes his time chewing. "Most smart, good looking women like yourself become lawyers, not cops. Leads me to believe something happened in order to send you down this particular path."

Kate returns her burger to her plate, trepidation flashing across her face, and it serves as a reminder for him to tread lightly. He couldn't afford to spook her.

"Maybe it did," she murmurs, taking a sip of water from her straw before returning her attention to her food, failing to meet his eyes as she spoke for the first time that night. "Either way, none of your business."

"Of course not," he agrees without missing a beat. "I wasn't trying to pry. You just… intrigue me."

Beckett furrows her brow at his, swallowing down the small bite of her burger. "Intrigue you? I don't even know you."

"Yet," he points out with his best grin, earning an eye roll in reply. "But hopefully that will change."

She shakes her head, something that resembles doubt flicking in her eyes, and it's his brow that creases with confusion this time.

"You're wasting your time," Kate tells him. "I'm not sure what has you so curious, but you'll notice pretty quickly that my life is ultimately rather boring."

"I don't believe that," he argues, knowing for a fact that her life is the _opposite_ of boring. "And even if that were true, that doesn't make _you_ boring, Kate. Doesn't make your story boring."

"My story?"

"Yeah, I'm a journalist, I crave a good story," he informs her with a smirk, but she drops her eyes back to her plate, her hardly touched food, and frowns.

Something tells him that learning Kate's story, weaseling his way into her life, is going to be harder than he had planned for. But that's okay, LokSat hadn't given him a timeframe, he was quite certain they couldn't care less how long it took him to draw Kate away from the conspiracy, as long as he did it successfully.

"Want to tell me your favorite color next?" he murmurs, trying to lighten the mood, pursing his lips to hold back the smile when Kate huffs a breath of laughter and nudges his foot beneath the table.

"It's purple."

* * *

Rick drapes his jacket over her shoulders once they're on the sidewalk outside of Remy's, the brisk September air swirling around her bare legs, and she offers him a grateful curl of her lips at the action.

It's been a while since she's dated a guy who held doors and donated his jacket to shield her skin from the chill, since she's gone out with a gentleman.

"So, Captain," he hums, proving too fond of using her title after knowing of it for only an hour. "Do you have to work in the morning?"

Kate nods, clutching the ends of his suit jacket and diverting her eyes to the concrete beneath their feet. "Rarely do I not have work in the morning."

"You have to have days off every now and then, right?" Rick asks her, falling into step beside her as she begins to stroll in the general direction of the nearest subway station.

"Sometimes," she hedges, unwilling to admit that she can't recall the last time she allowed herself to have a full day off of work.

"Then how about this?" Rick proposes, purposely grazing his knuckles along the back of her hand. "I'll give you my number tonight and the next time you have some free time, we can meet again, go on an actual planned date."

Her heart flutters with excitement, tickling the cage of her ribs with its feathering palpitations, but she bites her bottom lip, does her best to tamper it down. She had just wanted a date tonight, a way to prove to herself she could be normal, have a life outside of work just like everyone else, but Rick had been more than she'd planned for.

"You're thinking too hard, Kate," he teases, coming to a stop before they can reach the nearest crosswalk and touching tentative fingers to the bone of her wrist, sparking frissons of electricity through the simple brush of his fingertips.

"I just don't know if it's a good idea," she reasons, despite the argument the scent of his aftershave wafting up from his jacket evokes through her senses.

"You won't know that for sure until you actually give it a try."

She risks a glance at him, silently surprised by the intensity of longing in his eyes, and she wants so badly to say yes, to stop playing it safe and just give someone a chance, give Rick a chance.

"Okay," she murmurs, grinning at the sudden curl of his fingers around hers, the delighted smile claiming his lips. "Give me your number and I'll call you, plan something for sometime later this week."

Rick releases her hand to reach past her, withdraws a small notebook from one of the jacket pockets and quickly jots down a number for her on a sheet he rips off. But all she can manage to focus on is how badly her hand misses his warmth.

She accepts the piece of paper, trades him his jacket for his number, and suppresses the shiver the wind threatens to elicit as it whispers along her uncovered flesh, every inch of her going cold again.

Though, a burst of heat does spread from her cheek, where Rick places a gentle kiss, purposefully lingering, allowing her to feel the bloom of his smile against her skin.

"I look forward to hearing from you, Kate," he says as he draws back, his eyes sparkling like the city lights scattered all around them.

He walks away in the opposite direction, heading uptown, and Kate finally takes a deep breath, flicks her eyes down to the piece of paper folded in her hands. It's been so long since she's actually _liked_ someone, since the thought of seeing them again made her heart skip and stumble, and while the once unwelcome sensations scared her, the foreign giddiness was such a refreshing change from the harrowing hunt for LokSat.

Maybe Rick could be good for her, she considers as she starts down the path that will lead her home, or at least he could provide a nice distraction. She could use one of those.

* * *

The loft in SoHo that he's owned but rarely used for the last ten years is uncomfortable, too much space for one person, and he wanders around bored for most of the night, thinking about her. There's plenty he _could_ be doing, probably should be doing; he starts his new job tomorrow – oh, she was going to kill him – and the least he could do was go over the notes sent from LokSat's man inside the Twelfth.

Entertaining the idea of going out on an actual date with Kate is far more appealing.

He's never been on a date that wasn't a cover, a ploy for information in some way, and that's exactly what his next date with her would be. Nothing out of the ordinary for him, so why did he feel so disappointed that it wasn't _real_?

It's been a week since he began surveillance on her, a single evening in her presence, and she's already getting under his skin. And Castle cannot understand for the life of him what it is about her, what makes her different from all of the other female targets he's turned to conquests for the sake of the job.

Rick stands from the large, overbearing desk consuming at least half of the office space that his father had had furnished for him, just in case he ever needed the apartment for an assignment, for missions that were sometimes handled intimately. He strips on his way to the master bedroom, folding his clothes and placing them neatly on the edge of the king sized bed out of habit and checking the phone he had purchased last week, thumbing through the messages from his father, dismissing the mission updates from the team in the Middle East, and dropping the device onto the nearest pillow.

Castle drifts into the impressive en suite, steps into the shower and sets the water temperature as hot as it will go, until steam billows through the room, fogs the glass door, and the pelt of the water scalds his skin.

Kate Beckett may have slid beneath his skin, threaded herself through his veins and leaked into his bloodstream, but maybe it was a good thing, for now, for the sake of the mission. He'd have her out of his system by the time it was all over with.


	2. Chapter 2

Kate glares down at the information Vikram had messaged her about last night after she had arrived home, the text on her phone about new information on Vulcan Simmons shooting down the butterflies Rick had given life to in her stomach. She closes the manila folder that had been left on her desk this morning and scrapes a hand through her hair.

This is taking longer than she had expected and the slow progress, the lack of leads, was disheartening. She couldn't handle another case like her mother's, another albatross to wear around her neck, another leech to drain the life from her.

Beckett sucks in a shallow breath and fishes out the chain from beneath her blouse, fingering the engagement ring dangling from the end. She had found justice for her mother, she could do the same for her AG team.

"Hey Captain?"

She lifts her head at the knock on her door, the appearance of Kevin Ryan's head poking inside her office.

"This about the case?" she inquires, sliding the file on Simmons beneath the nearest stack of paperwork decorating her desk, searching for the notes she has on Ryan and Espo's latest double homicide case, but Ryan shakes his head.

"Uh no, actually, I thought you may want to know you had a new employee?"

Kate's gaze snaps back to him, her brow instantly furrowing with the information that is unwelcome news to her.

"New employee?" she repeats as Ryan steps inside, tilting his head towards the man following him inside, Esposito trailing in after him, and she's grateful her years of training have given her a brilliant poker face that keeps her jaw from falling open, her eyes from widening.

"This is Richard Castle, newest addition to our division," Ryan announces, eyeing Rick skeptically, but ultimately looking like a puppy beneath the tough exterior, excited to have a new member to the team, while Esposito resembles a guard dog, ready to attack. "Says he's supposed to work tech with Vikram, just wanted to verify this with you."

Kate narrows her gaze on Rick, but he only grins back at her, that same suave smile he had attempted to charm her with last night. "Thanks for the introduction, guys. I can take it from here, though."

Ryan nods, bows out easily, but Espo backtracks slowly out of her office door, flicking his eyes between her and Rick, throwing her his typical 'big brother' look. "Call if you need us, Captain."

Kate waves him off, waits until the door to her office is shut to rise from her desk chair.

"Tech analyst, huh? Could've sworn you mentioned something about journalism last night," she quips, waltzing up to him with an arched eyebrow and crossed arms, taking deep breaths through her nose to remain unaffected by the irritation raging through her bloodstream.

"I did," Castle nods, mimicking her, folding his arms over his chest and quirking his brow in challenge. "Can a man not have history in two different fields of study?"

"You knew who I was the entire time didn't you?" she hisses, but his head immediately begins to shake and his hands rise in supplication.

"No, I didn't make the connection until you mentioned the Twelfth."

"But you made the connection," she growls, the point of it all, but Rick only sighs in response.

"I didn't say anything because I wasn't even certain I'd be working in the Twelfth, Kate. I hadn't been assigned to a division yet," he tries to explain, seemingly genuine, but something is off, doesn't make sense. She would have been notified about a new hire in her division prior to the arrival of the employee. "I didn't think it was worth mentioning until I had all the facts."

Kate steps in closer, practically eye to eye with him in her favorite pair of heels, and she watches Rick waver at her proximity, but stand his ground, staring back at her with an enticing mixture of challenge and lust sparking in his eyes.

How the hell was she supposed to work with him?

"You should have mentioned it."

"Noted," he murmurs, unfolding his arms from his chest, dropping one hand to his side while the other ventures out to graze her hip with his knuckles. She doesn't move, doesn't acknowledge the touch with anything more with a raised eyebrow, but her body exalts at the simple contact, craving more. "Does this mean our next date is off?"

Beckett rolls her eyes. "Really think it's a smart idea? Dating your boss?"

"It does add a bit of a forbidden romance to the mix, doesn't it?" he muses, unfurling his fingers to splay at her waist, the heat of his palm draping over the bone of her hip through her pencil skirt, and she would never let anyone touch her like this. "Don't worry, Captain. I have no doubts that our professionalism will remain intact."

Kate plucks his hand from her hip, her traitorous body already mourning the loss, and turns back towards her desk.

"Don't expect to spend your days flirting with me in my office," she mutters, easing back into her chair and withdrawing her laptop from its case. She had enough work to do today, but first, she intends to do some serious research on Richard Castle. "Shadow Vikram for the rest of the day, garner an understanding of the job, and get to work."

"Yes, ma'am." Castle salutes her, backing out of her office with a sly grin that she ignores. She already hates him again.

* * *

The blue eyed detective, the one who seems to have warmed up to him already, Ryan, directs him towards Vikram's workspace across the floor and Castle knocks on the doorway before he enters.

And nearly stops in his tracks.

"You must be the new guy," the man, Vikram, announces, glancing up from his tech layout to meet Castle's gaze. Vikram gives him a narrowed look and nods towards the door that Rick closes with a soft click. "Good to see you again, Mr. Castle."

"Didn't expect to be seeing you again so soon," Rick murmurs, scanning the room, but aside from the computers, the tables of software, he's alone with the man he had met only days before, the man who had briefed him on Kate Beckett. "A head's up would have been appreciated."

"I'm a fan of surprises," Vikram shrugs. "We can't talk long here, it's too risky, but as I'm sure you've gathered, this is how you and I keep an eye on Kate Beckett during office hours. Now, I'm obligated to ask, have you made progress with her outside of work?"

There is no intrigue in Vikram's eyes, nothing but the impersonal expression that Rick remembers from the initial briefing over a week ago, interested in nothing more than the facts and the progress of the mission. Just another pawn.

"I would say so, yes."

"That's encouraging to hear, Agent. The boss will be pleased. He had his doubts," Vikram mutters, returning his focus to the computer screen in front of him. "But I've been watching the captain for a few months now, and I personally believe you'll be exactly what Beckett needs."

"What she needs?" Castle echoes, his brow furrowing at Vikram's description. From what he's seen in his short time spent with Kate, he can't imagine her 'in need' of much.

"I've been sending Captain Beckett dead-end leads since we teamed up to find LokSat a couple months ago, and while I'm committed to my job, I can admit it's a bit depressing to watch her wallow. It's your job to take her mind off of it all, maybe in the process you'll make her happy," Vikram muses, but the man looks as if he could truly not care less about Kate's happiness.

He knew he'd disliked this guy from the start for a reason.

"Anything's possible," Rick replies, stepping forward to stand beside Vikram, analyzing the codes he's processing on the computer screen. "But what about my job here at the Twelfth? I know the basics, but I should probably-"

"Don't worry too much about your cover here, I've got it under control. Your father informed us of your technological skills and you have enough to pass for an amateur, which is all that's necessary," Vikram explains, printing off what appears to be a list of phone numbers. "Your focus needs to be on Captain Beckett. So in terms of your _job_ , just play the role well enough and follow my lead. Otherwise, dedicate your time and energy to the real assignment."

Castle scowls while the man isn't looking, never a fan of taking orders, especially not from some LokSat lackey, and drifts towards the conference room's open blinds. He can see Kate in her office from here, her attention on whatever work lies scattered across her desk in front of her and the information on her computer screen. Her cop instincts are impressive, something he had known before ever meeting her, and she glances up at the sensation of being watched, must know the lingering gaze belongs to him, because she turns her head in his direction, spears him with a glare while he waves back at her.

His dislike for Vikram may already be strong, but Rick can tell he'll enjoy working here far more than the CIA office.

* * *

Castle is standing in the doorway of her office that night, the bullpen in a quiet lull over his shoulder, and Kate cuts her eyes to him, arching a single brow in question.

"What now?" she grumbles, scribbling her name at the bottom of another form, adding it to the nearly complete pile.

Rick had been bothering her all day, staring at her from across the floor until she had decided to seal the blinds to her office windows, but then he had brought her lunch from the café she often frequented down the street, and then coffee a couple of hours later. Vikram had reported back to her earlier, informed her that his new colleague had made good progress for his first day, but Beckett had no idea how when he'd spent most of his time annoying her.

"Cranky?" Castle assumes, sauntering inside, but he doesn't close the door behind him and she takes that as a positive sign he won't be here long. "It's nearly 8 o'clock, Kate."

"You can tell time, good to know," she praises under her breath, almost reaching for the near empty cup of coffee he had placed on her desk a half hour ago, but she refuses to give him the satisfaction of knowing how much she had appreciated the gesture.

"You've been here since six this morning," he points out, raising a hand in supplication when she looks up at him in accusation. "Ryan told me."

Kate places her pen to the surface of her desk and folds her hands in front of her, sucks in a breath to maintain her temper and tilts her head in feigned curiosity. "Did you get any work done today, Mr. Castle? Because it seems to me you spent the majority of your time gossiping and making lunch runs."

"Ooh, Mr. Castle. I could get used to that." Beckett rolls her eyes, redirects her attention to the last of her paperwork. "But really, Captain, I'm actually here because I feel guilty for not mentioning my involvement with the Twelfth at dinner last night."

"And how do you intend to resolve your guilty conscious, Rick?" she sighs, keeping her gaze glued to the words on the page that she can't manage to focus on.

"I was wondering if I could buy you a drink, I owe you that much."

She refrains from biting her lip, the idea appealing to her all too quickly. "Right, well, I don't think that's a good-"

"I also had some thoughts on the case we're working and could use your guidance?"

"You're not going to leave me alone until I say yes, are you?"

He's shrugging his shoulders when she finally returns her gaze to him. "I'm a persistent person. And I really wanted to see you again. Outside of work."

The sharp blue of his irises softens to the calming shade of cerulean she remembers from last night, that burst of sincerity spreading through his features to wash away the routine of charm and wit, and Beckett sighs out her defeat, signs her name on her last police report of the evening.

"Fine, but this doesn't count as our second date," she mutters, even as he grins with triumph.

Castle steps around her desk to retrieve her coat from the back of her chair when she rises, stands behind her to hold the outerwear up while she slips her arms through the sleeves. It's absolutely ridiculous that she has to repress a shiver that threatens to tremble through her frame at the caress of his fingers along her shoulders, but his touch has become magnetic within the last 24 hours, electricity crackling between them every time he gets too close.

"See if you say the same after I take you to the best bar in the city," Rick challenges, holding out his arm to her, but she declines with a shake of her head and a nod towards the bullpen still alive with activity.

She doesn't know what her status with Castle is, but she's certain she wants it to remain private while they figure it out.

"We'll see. In the meantime, how did you like working with Vikram?" Kate inquires after she's retrieved her purse from the bottom drawer of her desk and has locked up her office for the night.

Castle glances to the conference room Vikram usually works from, something dark flickering through his expression for a brief moment before it fades, concealed behind a pursed lipped smile.

"Not too bad," he answers, walking alongside her to the elevator up ahead. "I'm a fast learner when it comes to technology, but it isn't my favorite way to spend my time."

"Mm, not your passion then?" she muses, stepping inside the lift and pushing the button for the ground floor once Castle is inside.

"Not necessarily," he hedges, shifting away from her for a change. "I like it, but I prefer more active work. Like when Ryan and Esposito ran down that lead today? I almost asked to accompany them."

Kate scoffs. "I never would have approved that."

"Why not?" he huffs, an interesting flicker of indignation alive in his gaze. "I would handle myself in the field just fine."

"And you know that how, Castle? Because your journalism career often puts you in life or death situations that most cops face on a regular basis?" she challenges, striding out ahead of him when the elevator doors slide open.

"Hey, you'd be surprised what I'd do for a good story," he says as he trots along after her through the lobby, into the brisk air of the night outside. "Journalists risk their lives all the time. I, personally, have seen the brink of death quite often."

Kate rolls her eyes as he takes the lead towards their destination, but again, she notices beneath his usual exterior, beneath the play of their banter, something dark and serious lies in the lines carved around his mouth, branching from his eyes. It almost makes her believe that there's some truth to his tales.

It has her convinced that there's more to this lighthearted journalist, a mystery she's compelled to solve. Tonight, she gathers evidence.


	3. Chapter 3

They take the subway downtown, standing near the doors of the crowded train and swaying with the curves of the tracks.

"You're a native New Yorker," Castle murmurs the observation, glancing past the pole they're both holding onto for balance.

"What makes you so sure?" she inquires, arching an eyebrow, but she's made the same study as him, knows he's picked up on just as many of her personality traits as she has of his.

"Well, you're not bridge and tunnel, no trace of boroughs when you talk, so you're from Manhattan. I'm aware that anyone can move here, adapt to the city, but you navigate through it with a familiarity that seems instinctive," he assesses, looking her over as if she's a challenge, a mystery of his own to solve. "Even riding the subway with you, I can sense that same comfort level, as if you've been doing it your whole life."

"You're not too different, you know," she counters, shifting in closer to him when the train comes to a stop, releasing a handful of people onto the crowded platform, receiving a new bunch that hustles in to fill the empty spaces. "You're a native too, just as comfortable with the city as I am."

The doors slide closed, but Kate stays within the radius of his warmth, an inch away from leaning into his side.

"Don't sound so sure of yourself," Castle quips, but she knows her assumptions are true. "I may have grown up in the city, but I've been moving around since my childhood."

"Oh? Military parents?"

A flicker of tension ripples through the flex of his fingers around the pole, but the brush of her hand eradicates his hesitation to answer her, trepidation vanishing as his eyes drift to her flirting fingertips. It's hardly been 24 hours since she met him and already she holds such power over him.

"Something like that," Castle nods, his thumb rising to wrestle with hers. His voice has fallen into a low murmur that she has to lean forward to hear, taking advantage of their close proximity to dip her head towards him. "I lived here with my mother until I was around five, maybe six. Then my father gained custody over me."

"But surely your mom must have had some sort of custody over you as well, right? An every other weekend sort of arrangement?"

The line of his throat bobbed with a thick swallow, and for a second too long, she is mesmerized by the ripple of skin, the sturdy bone of his jaw she had spent the night before daydreaming about pressing her mouth to, tasting with her tongue and scraping with her teeth.

"No, sole custody. I hardly remember my mother," he states, the words hollow on his lips, lacking the usual charisma and flair that accompanied most of his responses, giving way to that shred of darkness that hides beneath.

And it shouldn't matter to her, but something about seeing him shrouded in the strange emptiness that claims his face unnerves her, awakens the urge to fix it.

Kate rewards him for the honesty, allows the sway of the train to tilt her into his side, bumping his hip and drawing him back from the dark, back into the light with her.

"When did you move back here?" she asks, following his gaze to their hands, their thumbs still teasing but his fingers inching closer to thread through hers.

She makes no move to stop him.

"Early twenties," he mumbles. "Did some traveling into the city between that time, but ultimately, I didn't reside here for a while. What about you, ever live anywhere else?"

He's attempting to change the subject, redirect the attention onto her, and she lets him. This once.

"During my first year of college, while I was in Stanford."

"Stanford? Wow," Castle hums, his brow hitching in acclamation. "So California wasn't all you'd hoped?"

Beckett uses her free hand to tuck her hair behind her ear, buying time. She isn't ready to tell him about her mother, the personal tragedy that had changed the course of her life so severely that she'd transferred schools before the holiday break had come to an end, enrolled in NYU by the time the Spring semester began.

"No, it wasn't that. I just had too many reasons to come home," she murmurs, glancing to the map when the train comes to a stop and Castle is withdrawing their tangled hands from the pole, guiding her off of train and out into the station.

"I hate to put this conversation on hold, but I'd much rather continue it in privacy," he says, keeping close to her side as they spill from the train with the rest of human traffic.

"Where exactly are we going?"

She doesn't like to be led, but Kate doesn't let go of his hand, climbing the stairs with him to street level, failing to relinquish the connection of his fingers even once they're back on the sidewalk.

"I told you, the best bar in the city," Castle tosses back over his shoulder while they zigzag through the evening crowds for a couple of blocks, slowing in front of a pub and trotting down a short flight of stairs. "Welcome to the Old Haunt, what every bar should aspire to be."

She doesn't roll her eyes out of courtesy to him, attempting to appreciate the aroma of stale beer and the live concert of a piano player. Castle releases her hand to place his to the small of her back, guiding her towards an empty booth near the back of the establishment, fairly crowded but not overwhelming.

Not a bad place for a second date. If that's what this was.

"Okay Captain, what would you like to drink?" Castle grins once they're both seated and Kate follows the tilt of his head towards the chalkboard menu overhead. She's never been a big drinker, though, and isn't in the mood to mull over her options.

"Surprise me, Castle."

Beckett watches him signal the bartender with ease, nodding to the middle-aged man in greeting and lifting two fingers in the air.

"You really are a regular, huh?"

"I like this place, it's cozy," Rick defends, folding his hands atop the polished wood of the table. His eyes scan the room, a subtle but familiar action she often completes herself, cataloguing every patron before they return to settle on her. "Now, back to you and your college days."

"What more is there to say?" Kate murmurs, lifting her gaze to roam the walls, the collection of black and white photos framed overhead.

"There's always more," he says confidently, thanking the bartender who delivers their drinks to the table, two tumblers of sparkling honey-colored liquor. "Like what you studied while you were in Stanford."

"I was pre-law, on the path to becoming the first female Chief Justice," she admits, accepting the glass he nudges towards her, but watching him take a sip of his own instead.

"Wow, not bad," he appraises, and she ignores the ridiculous little flutter in her chest, the satisfaction of eliciting that impressed gleam in his eyes. "What changed your mind?"

The pleasant flicker fades, overwhelmed by the true answer to his question that she refuses to speak.

"My priorities. What about you, Rick? Was journalism always your dream?" she questions, keeping her gaze low, her lashes successfully hiding her eyes from him, but he doesn't push, taking the opportunity to change the course of the conversation, attempting to find a balance.

"I don't think I ever had a specific dream," Castle muses, fiddling with the cuff of his sleeve, and she discretely lifts her eyes, catches the frown lines deepening around his mouth. "I think I'm still trying to figure it out. Working as a digital investigator for the NYPD has its perks though."

"Oh yeah?" she chuckles, meeting his smirk across the table. "Partnering up with Vikram is that great?"

"I was actually referring to the view from our workspace. Until you shut the blinds to your office that is," he grumbles, but the corners of his mouth are still twitching with amusement.

She hides her grin behind the rim of her glass as she takes a sip of the bourbon. "Excuse me for trying to work without your creepy staring distracting me."

"Creepy? Please. It's totally endearing."

"Is that how you seduce your women, Castle? Creepily stare until they fall under your spell?" she teases, quirking an eyebrow at him.

"No, I've reserved this tactic solely for you."

"I'm flattered."

His smirk blooms into a smile at her dry tone, one that she has to look away from before it spreads to her lips as well. Their bantering could be fun, a game of back and forth that had her imagining all of the other ways his quick-witted tongue could be put to use, but the red flag in the back of her mind remained standing tall and intrusive. She was growing to like him despite their short timeframe of knowing one another, and while he could make her laugh and awaken long lost butterflies in her stomach, the nagging sense that she was missing something continued to bother her.

Castle's fingers graze the watch adorning her wrist and she startles, instinctually draws her hand away, curses herself for it when it ignites the intrigue in his eyes.

"Don't-"

"Was it your dad?" he murmurs, his gaze trained on the man's watch she wears like a talisman, and Kate huffs, strokes her thumb over the leather band. A single day has passed and he's already prying into her life, pawing at wounds that are scarred over but not yet fully healed, and always looking at her with such genuine concern in his gaze that makes her _want_ to tell him these things.

And it's been so long since the idea of sharing a piece of her past, allowing another person to witness one of the few vulnerable parts of her, has been anything but terrifying for her.

"My mother," she confesses, staring down into the melting ice cubes in her glass, attempting to brace herself. Telling this story no longer made her fall apart, but it always left her heart feeling scraped raw without fail every time it spilled from her lips. "Not my father."

Castle drifts in closer, but doesn't attempt to touch her, to offer any sort of premature comfort, only leaning in to listen, and she's grateful for it, for how he manages to make her feel as if they are the only two in the bar without suffocating her at the same time.

"We were supposed to go to dinner, my mom, my dad and I. She was supposed to meet us at the restaurant but she never showed." She doesn't have to see him to sense the change in his demeanor, the realization that has already dawned on him. He knows where this story is going, how it will end, but he remains silent, unable to interrupt her. "Two hours later, we went home and there was a detective waiting for us. They found her body, she had been… stabbed." Kate skims her thumb over the drops of condensation trailing along her glass, reminds herself to swallow before the lump in her throat can form. "Not a robbery, or a sexual assault. Gang violence is what the detectives working the case attributed it to, a random wayward event that wrapped it all up in a nice little box."

She grits her teeth, but the tension in her jaw dissipates when he covers the fist of her hand on the tabletop, when she glances up to see him watching her with grief so sharp in his eyes, as if he's absorbed her pain through her words, feels the sharp pang of it in his chest like she does.

"It's taken my entire career," Beckett murmurs, abandoning her glass to fidget with the chain around her neck. "But I eventually found the man who ordered the hit on her, finally put him away."

"Bracken," he murmurs, snagging her attention. "I remember seeing it on the news now, that footage of you arresting a state senator. Must have been the most satisfying thing in the world."

A sigh slips from her lips. "I thought it would be."

"It wasn't?"

Kate hesitates, but shakes her head, withdraws her hand from beneath his to cross her arms over her chest. "Finding justice for my mom had been my world for so many years and of course, once I finally discovered the truth, arrested Bracken, there was a sense of victory…"

"But also a sense of loss?" Castle finishes for her and she tears her gaze from the amber liquid of her drink, meets the understanding in Rick's eyes. He's the first person she's been able to admit this truth to, but she hadn't expected for it to resonate with him, for him to actually understand.

"Like I had nothing left, even though having justice for her should have been more than enough," she mumbles, but he's shaking his head.

"Solving her case became the center of your world, Kate. With that gone, it's understandable to feel a little lost, to crave something else to fill the void."

"How do you know this?" Beckett questions, searching his face for a breach in his solid exterior, a chink in his armor, some kind of hint that could shed light on whatever it is he's hiding. "Have you - have you lost someone too?"

His expression gives her nothing, but Castle's body is on the verge of squirming in the booth, his eyes flicking towards the exit, and she mimics his move from earlier, from their time in the subway, and covers the hand he has on the table to stay him.

"I haven't lost anyone, I just – it feels the same for me when I finish with an assignment. I spend days, sometimes months focusing solely on one story and once it's done, I'm left wondering what's next," he explains, his gaze on their hands but his brow creasing with conflict. "Sometimes I just want a story that never has to end."

Her chest clenches, a combination of empathy and a strange yearning she can't comprehend weaving around her heart and squeezing hard. He isn't talking about her, but something inside of her wishes he was, wants something she knows she is no longer meant to have.

"It sounds like both of our stories could use some work," she sighs, tracing his knuckles with her thumb, and Castle lifts his eyes to her, the shadows across his face dissipating.

"As long as I can write you into mine, I think I'd be pretty content," he muses, lacing their fingers and chuckling when she rolls her eyes at him, but the corners of her mouth are curling upwards, amusement bubbling to life behind her lips.

"Let's just see how this chapter goes," Beckett mumbles, drawing her hand free of his and easing out of the booth, starting for the exit and not having to look over her shoulder to know that Castle is following.

"I'm game," he quips from behind her once they're taking the stairs to the street, his shoulder brushing with hers. "Is this where we part ways for the night, Captain Beckett?"

Kate stalls on the sidewalk with him, just as she had the night before, dividing her gaze between him and the street that will lead her home. She had to work in the morning, but it was hardly late and she wasn't ready for her night with him to be over just yet.

"I actually don't live far from here, walk with me," she murmurs, reaching out to slip her arm through his, and pointedly ignoring the surprise she can see spreading across his face.

* * *

Strolling through the streets lit by the glow of the city with Kate Beckett at night is oddly peaceful, Tribeca far more appealing when viewed from beside her rather than when he was following her around for surveillance. He doubts that she will take him as far as her apartment, but he's content to walk with her arm laced through his and her warmth at his side for as long as she wants.

They take their time, traveling in comfortable silence, but Kate slows to a stop once they approach a subway station on Franklin Street, ready to part ways he assumes, and while he may not be a true journalist, he still craves the rest of the story. Whatever she will give him of her story.

"You never told me about the watch."

Kate glances down to her wrist once more, a soft smile gracing her lips. "My dad took her death hard. He's sober now, twelve years."

A returning smile stretches across his mouth, the affectionate pride she wears for her father contagious, but his lips begin to fall as she withdraws the chain he had noticed around her neck earlier, caressing the ring she holds between her fingers.

"So I wear the watch for the life that I saved. And this," she murmurs, her eyes remaining on the ring between them, shimmering in the light of streetlamps overhead. "Is for the life that I lost."

His father always taught him that empathy is an enemy, to harden his heart to others to protect his own, but for Kate… the fortress of his ribs caves in, collapsing atop his heart, leaving it punctured and scraped and aching. All for a woman who is nothing more than an assignment marked for death.

He wants to hold her, to wrap her in his arms until the ache in his chest recedes and she no longer looks so brittle with memories, but he knows better, has studied her long enough to know Kate Beckett would turn away the offer of his open arms.

"Don't look so heartbroken on my account, Castle," she mumbles, nudging him with her elbow, but the quirk of her lips is forced, straining to create a grin before giving up.

"I just - you deserve so much more, you deserve to be happy," he manages, watching her brow crease, knitting with confusion.

"You don't know me well enough to say those kinds of things, Rick."

"Maybe not, but I can say that I _want_ you to be happy, right?"

Her lips part, but no words fall free, exasperation flooding through her eyes instead, as if she just can't figure him out. Which is exactly what he needs, so why does it elicit the urge to make her understand?

"Kate-"

"Shh, enough for tonight," Beckett murmurs, but her voice is soft, tired but placating like the hands she places to his chest, the warmth of her palms penetrating the fabric of his shirt. "Let's save this conversation for the third date."

Castle lifts an eyebrow at her, leaning into the touch of her hands to bracket her hips with his. "So this counts as a second date after all?"

He feels the cascade of relief rush down her spine, flushing out the tension his thoughtless statements had evoked, and the beginnings of a smirk flirt along her lips. He needs to get it together, to remember his purpose for integrating himself into Kate Beckett's world and stop allowing his attraction to her to fluster him. She's smart, arguably more intelligent than any other woman he's had to fool, and if he isn't careful, if he allows her to discover any more than she already knows, his mission would fail. And Kate would die.

"Yeah, Castle," she decides, curling her hands at his biceps as she drifts forward, smears her lips to his cheek before she pulls away. "I'll see you at work tomorrow."


	4. Chapter 4

Castle brings her coffee the next morning, placing it on her desk with his charming smile, and she has to force her eyes to roll to refrain from smiling back. She had thought about him last night, long after they had parted ways at the subway stop near her apartment, and the rebellious flutter keeps time in her chest from the second he steps into her office, late into the afternoon.

Throughout the day, Kate can feel his eyes on her, his stare penetrating the slit blinds and the pleased grin in place every time she cuts her gaze upwards to glare at him. And while she may not mind the attention – just this once – Vikram doesn't seem to be a fan of the lack of focus Castle pays to the work surrounding them in the room, smacking him with a file and earning a bemused look that has Kate stifling a laugh.

They don't plan a third date despite how often the thought of it crosses her mind. The precinct's caseload, her meetings with 1PP, easily take up all of her time and energy for the following few weeks, and one of the best things about Castle is that he gets it. He sees her nearly every day, witnesses how thin she's often stretched, and knows exactly when to push her, when to back off. The closest she's ever come to this kind of successful communication was years ago when she had dated Demming from Robbery for a handful of months.

Though, her relationship with Tom had never made it past the stage of embers. Rick Castle had sparks exploding through her veins on a daily basis, and they hadn't even kissed yet. They could be so good together, she knows that for a fact, and it makes her brave. Makes her stupid.

"Castle?"

He glances up from his laptop with startled eyes, surprise rippling through his retinas at the sight of her standing in the workroom doorway for a change. She never came to him, always the other way around, but a little balance couldn't hurt.

"Evening, Captain. Something I can do for you?" he quips, the smirk already tugging at his lips.

The afternoon light is fading, streaks of gold from the setting sun bleeding across his shoulders, and Kate drifts into the empty room, props her hip against the edge of the table.

Ryan and Esposito had closed their case after lunch, spent the rest of the workday filing paperwork and praying that another body would fail to drop. Apparently, their prayers had been answered. Both men had gone home by five, Vikram too, and while there was always more work she could be doing (between her responsibilities as captain and her investigation into LokSat, free time had ceased to exist for her), she was taking the evening off, and she knew exactly how she wanted to spend it.

"Yeah, want to get out of here?" she replies, quirking her brow at him and watching in amusement as his laptop slams closed, the paperwork is put away, and Rick Castle is standing at her side in a matter of seconds.

She doesn't exactly have anything in mind, it's been so long since she's planned an actual date and this is rather spur of the moment, but Rick seems all too pleased just to be walking out of the building with her.

"Taking me somewhere specific?" he inquires once they're on the sidewalk, and Kate glances down to her attire, her typical blazer and pencil skirt combo, chews on her bottom lip.

"Yeah, my place so I can change."

His eyes sparkle but she ignores him, starts towards the subway station, but Castle is already hailing a cab, shrugging his shoulders when she cocks an eyebrow at him in question.

"Quicker this way. Besides, I'm paying."

"Eager, Castle?" she mutters as the cabbie he caught the attention of slows to a stop for them, sliding inside the car when he holds open the door.

"Depends," he muses, following her in and waiting for her to give the cabbie her address before he speaks again. "Is this going to be our third date?"

Kate hums, pretending to mull over the idea as the taxi pulls into traffic, zigzagging around the slower moving cars. "I didn't have anything planned, but we could figure something out."

"I'm up for anything," Rick grins, his features alight with excitement, looking so much like a little boy in that moment, and she shifts closer to him in the backseat, watches the boy merge with the man as his eyes darken.

"Well, what's something you've never done with anyone else?"

His confidence wavers, his brow creasing with thoughtfulness, a touch of confusion too, as if the simple question overwhelms him. Interesting, but not much help, Castle.

"What if we start with food, go from there?" she suggests and he immediately nods his approval.

"Sure, whatever you're in the mood for."

They spend the remainder of the ride to her apartment in comfortable silence, his hand flirting with her exposed knee, fingers skimming the hem of her skirt. She ignores him, for the most part, prepared to pin his hand to her patella if he ventures any higher, but he stays within the unspoken boundaries, drives her crazy with the maddening trail of his thumb along the inside of her knee.

The second the cab stops, she's shoving the door open to escape while he pays the driver, willing the flush she can feel climbing her neck to dissipate beneath the cool breeze of the evening air.

"You okay, Beckett?" he asks, a smug glimmer in his eyes once he joins her on the sidewalk outside her building, falling into step beside her as she leads the way through the lobby. "You look a little tense."

"I hate you," she huffs, but he's laughing at her, standing too close to her in the elevator, and if she doesn't get a grip, catch her breath, she and Castle may spend the rest of this impromptu date within the walls of her bedroom.

She tries to distract him from torturing her once the doors slide open on the third floor and they're walking side by side down the hall, asking him what he'd be open to for dinner, and attempting to figure out where to go afterwards.

"We have pizza all the time. We order in at the precinct so much, it's ridiculous," he complains while she unlocks her front door, and it was true, but it didn't look as if the less than satisfactory diet was affecting him. His body still appeared rock solid beneath his clothes.

"So I'm assuming we can rule out pizza and Chinese then," she chuckles, dropping her keys onto the table and shedding her blazer, kicking off her heels by the door. She's inches shorter without the pumps, but her arches flex, her toes popping on the hardwood of her floor, with relief at the freedom. "How about Italian? Or is that too close to pizza for you?"

Kate withdraws the rubber band from her hair, combing her fingers through the tangles, but glancing over her shoulder at Castle's prolonged silence.

Only to see him staring at her with parted lips and unmistakable arousal in his eyes that he quickly blinks away.

"You just - you smell like cherries," he gets out, sheepish, kind of adorable. "But yeah, Italian's fine."

"Okay. Good. I'll just…" She strides for her bedroom, her heart skipping and stumbling against the barrier of her ribs with every step. Kate takes a deep breath inside the safety of her room, the confined space of her closet, and strips from her work clothes without thinking too much about Castle in her living room.

Though, the reminder that he's alone in her home with access to all of her personal items does hasten her change into a sweater and jeans, boots with a low heel, and a leather jacket. She doesn't allow herself to linger in the mirror too long, adjusting her clothing and sparing only a handful of seconds to touch up her makeup, and as she emerges from her bedroom, she's greeted with exactly what she had expected – Castle examining her bookshelf like he was attempting to memorize the rows of novels.

"Interesting library," he remarks without shame, dusting his fingers along the spines. He turns his head from her mystery section to roam his eyes up and down her body, the electric blue of his eyes sparking even brighter. "Also, you look gorgeous in purple."

She bites back the 'you too' on the tip of her tongue, offers him a 'thanks' instead, and retrieves her keys, packs them into her purse with the rest of her essentials - gun, badge, credit card, ID, and chapstick.

"You have a really nice place too," he adds, sweeping his eyes over the interior of her apartment as she opens the door and he steps out into the hall.

"Thanks, it was a great find. Especially after my last one blew up."

Castle's eyes go comically wide, already begging for the story behind that statement, and Kate links her arm through his in something that is steadily becoming a bad habit, already prepared to give it to him.

* * *

Dates with Kate Beckett are becoming his favorite pastime. She's different outside the precinct, unwound and allowing her smile to slip free more often, and little by little, he's beginning to learn more about her. From her past of childhood summers spent at her father's cabin upstate and days on the couch with her mother binging soap opera episodes, to her time in the Academy, her work as the most successful homicide detective of this generation, to her present as captain of the Twelfth precinct.

She attempts to merge into conversation about his life, but even if he'd wanted to tell her the truth, to blow his cover right there, he wouldn't have much to tell. He hardly remembers the years with his mother, chooses to ignore those spent with his father, the CIA. He doesn't live in the past; he lives only in the moment, in the mission, and tries to forget the rest.

They have dinner at a hole in the wall Italian place he's never heard of. He's crammed into a corner table in the back with his to the wall so he can face the entrance, dividing his gaze between the door and the flicker of candlelight that lines the tables and paints streaks of gold along Kate's face. It's a lot less serious than their last 'date', gritty talk of their pasts left untouched, traded in for familiar banter concerning cases at the precinct, jokes about the boys. Ryan and Espo have taken to calling them 'Mom and Dad' after picking up on the prolonged time he spends in her office every morning, presenting her with coffee and the occasional bear claw, and latching onto their bickering in the break room the other day.

"What're Mom and Dad fighting about now?" Ryan had sighed, approaching Esposito in the doorway, and both he and Kate had gone silent and still by the coffee machine.

"What'd you call us?" Castle had asked, receiving a sparkle of amusement in Ryan's eyes.

"You guys have been fighting like an old married couple every other day since Castle showed up a month ago," Esposito points out.

"Seemed fitting," Ryan adds with a shrug.

Beckett had scowled at them, but Castle had preened at the observation. Her boys had been wary of him from the moment he had stepped foot inside the Twelfth, and he knew Esposito still didn't trust him completely, but despite his place in the tech department with Vikram, it was Kate and her boys who he worked alongside most, who he saw as his teammates.

They were a family and it was wholly unrealistic of him, but part of him – one of the emptier, hollow parts of him – wanted to be considered a member of it, to have that unbreakable trust and companionship they shared.

After dinner, they stroll through Manhattan with no real destination in mind, Kate's hand slipping into the embrace of his without hesitation. He's content to let her lead, following her past Bryant Park.

"Ever been ice skating?" Kate asks, intrigue in her eyes as they flicker from the nearby rink swarming with people and back to him.

"Uh, no," he answers honestly, the prospect of joining the slew of skaters terrifying. A combat mission in a foreign country with no backup and the enemy closing in on him? He could handle that. Ice skating in a park with Kate Beckett? Not so much.

"Breathe, Castle. I'm not going to drag you onto the ice tonight," she chuckles, drifting in closer to him on the sidewalk as they meander through the flow of street traffic. "But you've seriously never been?"

He shakes his head and Kate glances up to him with something like sympathy in her eyes. If he had to guess, he would assume ice skating, and other fun activities like it, was something she had been treated to often as a child, something she had shared with her parents probably. He chose not to recall most of his childhood, but he knew there had never been time or even the opportunity for things like heading to the park on a cold winter day, strapping on skates and gliding across a lake of ice. His father hadn't necessarily been a bad parent, but he had been too busy training Rick, preparing him for Langley, grooming him to be the perfect spy.

Rick still felt inadequate.

"I'll fix that."

"You just want to see me fall on my ass."

"Added benefit," she hums, and it takes all of his willpower not to lean over, wipe the smirk from her mouth with his lips.

They continue walking downtown, stopping for coffee and sharing a pastry for dessert. The night is growing colder, but they end up in a park closer to Tribeca, Kate guiding him towards an empty swing set. He can hear a band of street musicians in the near distance, the crooning of a trumpet and the accompaniment of a saxophone filtering through the sounds of the city to reach them, and he tugs on Beckett's hand before she can take a seat.

Her brow curves with amusement when he pulls her in, bands an arm around her waist and splays his palm at the small of her back. He expects her to break the hold, but in the privacy of the park, the surrounding trees and lonely swings their only audience, Kate leans into his embrace, accepts his proffered hand and curls her free arm around his neck.

"Should have told me you wanted to dance, Castle," she teases, her breath a hot rush along his ear as they slowly begin to sway. "I know a few jazz clubs in the area."

But Rick shakes his head, purposely brushes his lips to her ear as he speaks. "I like this better."

Kate hums, seemingly unnerved, but her fingers tighten at his nape, tangling in the hairs at the base of his skull.

"Why, Castle? Think it's easier to woo me into becoming another one of your conquests like this?"

"Or I could be one of yours."

Her eyes roll and her teeth pierce her bottom lip as she drifts in to hide her smile from him. Castle hums with amusement at her lack of verbal response, his fingers branching to splay across the small of her back.

"I don't want you to be a conquest, Beckett," he murmurs, the rush of words ruffling her hair, upsetting the steady rhythm of her breathing. The cage of her ribs expands, her palm beginning to perspire within the embrace of his, but he merely squeezes her hand.

Kate releases a sigh that stutters its way past her lips, trembles along his cheek. "We'll see."

"Good enough for me," he grins, rubbing slow circles with his thumb at the base of her spine, feeling the spike of tension through her frame begin to unfurl, allowing her to relax against him.

The cherry scent of her lotion permeates his senses, the vanilla of her perfume twining with the nighttime breeze swirling with the slow sway of their bodies. Normally, he has all of the words, a mental script well prepared, but with Kate… it was so close to being real. If he closed his eyes, focused solely on the heat of her frame pressed against him, the graze of her cheek to his jaw and the warmth of her breath cascading along his ear, he could pretend that there was no mission. That there was no LokSat, no Richard Castle the spy; that this role he played for her wasn't acting at all.

Castle jerks to a stop and it causes Kate to startle against him, her fingers snagging in the collar of his jacket as her head pulls back, her eyes flying to meet his in concern.

"Rick?"

He glances down to the pools of her irises, bottle green in the streetlights, flecks of gold illuminating the worry in her gaze. When did he stop looking at her like an assignment?

"Castle, what's the matter?" she demands and Rick lifts his hand from her back to rub at his eyes, digging his fingers into the sockets until they burn with bursts of light.

"Sorry," he mumbles, blinking past the induced crackles of white and forcing a smile, but the crease in her brow only deepens and he releases the first lie he can think of. "Thought I saw someone I recognized."

"A bad someone?" she questions, her body shifting in closer to his, slotting into place. Protective. "You look scared."

"What? Scared? No, I'm…" Castle sighs, drops his hand back to its natural resting place at her waist, absentmindedly brushing his thumb along the protruding bone of her hip. "Bad someone," he confirms, and beneath the concern still swarming her gaze, he notices the suspicion lurking in her eyes too.

"Do you want to go back to my place? We could have coffee," she suggests, wholly innocent, a good friend trying to comfort him in his shaken state. Or a good cop prepared to use her home field advantage to interrogate him.

Rick squeezes her hip, offers her one of his best smiles to dispel the lingering concern etched into the lines of her face. "I had a really great time, Kate, but I-"

"Hey," she cuts him off with her hand at his cheek, cool, slender fingers dusting along his jaw before falling away to rest atop his chest, where she can surely feel the accelerating throb of his heart.

Christ, what was she _doing_ to him?

"You can talk to me too, you know?"

Oh, how he wishes that were true, how he wishes he could tell her everything.

"I know," he murmurs, lies, with a nod, finding her fingers just below his collarbone and bringing the warm tips to his lips. "Thank you, Captain."

She rolls her eyes and taps the seam of his mouth, seeing right through his purposeful diversion, but letting it slide.

"Still going to decline my invitation for coffee?" she challenges and Castle draws her fingers down to his chin, not yet willing to let her go.

Following Kate back to her apartment after his slip up would be a risk; he needed time alone to get his head straight, shove the facts back into place. On the flip side, though, wouldn't he risk arousing even more suspicion if her said no when he so clearly wants to say yes to more time with her?

"Only if you promise not to take advantage of me," he decides, expecting another eye roll, a shake of her head, but Kate drifts in on the toes of her boots, flicks her eyes to land on his mouth for one long, maddening moment.

"Oh, Castle. You'll know when I'm ready to take advantage of you."


	5. Chapter 5

It's past midnight when Rick Castle finally rises from her sofa, taking his empty coffee mug to her sink, and she hesitates to follow, to walk him to the door and say goodnight. After watching him spook in the park, she had been intent on dragging out of him whatever had startled the contentment from his frame, left his face ashen and so… grief stricken. But once they had walked back to her place and returned to her apartment, after she'd brewed a fresh pot of coffee and curled up on her couch opposite him, they had fallen into a slew of different conversations.

He was an interesting man, still far too interesting for a digital investigator by day and city journalist by night. Something still didn't fit, but he knew exactly how to draw her away from topics he didn't want to discuss, knew what sore spots of hers to counter with if she pushed too hard.

So they balanced, dancing along the edges of personal questions, discussing everything in between until their cups were empty and her eyes were beginning to droop with the warmth of comfort and his company.

"Well, Captain Beckett, I presume I'll be seeing you tomorrow?"

Kate sighs and pushes up from the sofa, popping her spine and flexing her toes on the hardwood before she approaches him, stalling in her kitchen.

She's had nothing to drink but the red wine from dinner, alcohol that has already dissolved throughout the walk home with him, their impromptu dancing in the park, the proximity of him so close all eliminating the dull hum of it from her veins. And yet, despite her suspicions, her unease over secrets he isn't telling her, her body still buzzes with a different kind of intoxication.

She isn't ready to say goodnight, but she isn't ready for more either. Where does that leave her, them?

"You could stay, you know. For a little longer. We could watch a movie on my laptop," she suggests, casting her gaze towards the device on her coffee table to avoid meeting the gaze she can feel ascending to study her.

Castle takes a step away from the sink, crossing the short distance that lingers between the two of them until he's standing before her in the middle of the apartment. When she finally musters the courage to stop staring at her laptop, lift her eyes to the man gazing down at her, a laugh nearly bubbles to her lips. He looks so ridiculously pleased by the request, his irises sparkling pools of blue, his mouth in that lopsided grin he can't seem to control whenever he's alone with her.

In front of everyone else, his smile was charming, a winning spread of his lips and glimpse of his teeth that could get him whatever, whoever, he wanted. But with her… it was so much more genuine.

Kate touches her fingers to that smile without thinking, watches the color of his eyes change, cerulean to a deep blue as she grazes the corner of his mouth with her fingertips, slips her digits down to caress the rough skin of his jaw.

He was hiding things, that much had been clear from the start, but so was she. And over time, he's revealed things too, given her insight to his childhood, glimpses into his college years, told her stories about all of the places he's traveled to for the sake of his journalism career – personal details of his life that she's done little to earn. Maybe Rick Castle is more like her than she thinks. Maybe with more time, more effort put towards scaling those walls he's put up to keep others out, he'll tell her everything and eventually, she could do the same.

They could make a good team. The dynamic was there, the spark between them prevalent, growing into an electric current that crackled sharp and bright with need.

They could be so good together.

"Kate."

She represses the shudder her body emits at the low husk of her name in his mouth, the drop of his voice a warm caress to her senses, sweet gasoline to the ever-present flame within her stomach.

Beckett coasts her hand along the length of his jawline, her palm cradling the defined angle of bone while her fingers extend to coil around his ear. Rick's eyes flutter shut beneath her touch, his body listing towards her, a magnet drawn to its partner.

"You could stay," she repeats, drawing her other hand up his side, strumming the rungs of his ribs, biting her bottom lip when Castle drifts to press in closer, his nose bumping hers as their foreheads meet.

He's tentative, gentle with her even as she feels how the desire thrums beneath the surface of his frame. His palm is an anchor at her nape, his fingers fissures of contact that zip through her bloodstream when they splay at her hip.

It's so slow, so agonizingly slow, but Kate tilts her chin upwards, feels the exhale of his breath coat her lips and waits for the first taste of his mouth only an inch away to-

The buzz of her phone rattling harshly on the coffee table has them both jerking with surprise, the stillness broken, the moment gone, and he knows better than to stay her, try to sway her. Castle drops his hand from her face without hesitation, his fingers slipping from her waist with reluctance that has her cursing under her breath.

Kate turns away from him to snag the device from the table, a fresh wave of dread like ice water dousing the heat of her insides, extinguishing the lovely flame that had been lit mere moments ago.

"Precinct?"

Castle is approaching, his fingers grazing her waist as he steps up behind her, and Beckett presses the phone to her outer thigh, hides the message from Vikram urging her to rendezvous at their 'headquarters' to go over a new lead within the next hour. For the first time since her investigation into LokSat began, she doesn't jump at the chance for a new lead. Tonight, she curses it instead.

"Kinda," she admits on a sigh, closing her eyes and leaning back against the broad wall of Castle's chest so close. She feels his breath catch for a split second, knows she never should have allowed the moment to begin with, but he recovers before she can pull away.

"Want backup?" he quips, large hands framing the harsh bones of her hips.

They fit well. His hands on her waist, his chest at her back, his mouth on hers-

"Not tonight." Beckett covers his hands, gives them a brief squeeze before dislodging them from her hips, and turning to face him with regret flaring bright in the pit of her stomach, replacing that pleasant flutter of arousal. "Rain check on the movie?"

"You just say the word, Captain Beckett," he murmurs, his lips stretching into a grin, the striking blue of his eyes faded with disappointment that she shares, but softening for her as he leans forward, dusts his mouth to her forehead. "And I'm all yours."

Kate swallows hard, not sure whether the excitement or the dread that sentence evokes is stronger, but she musters a small, returning smile before he can pull away, release her to start for the door.

"Good luck with the precinct duties," Castle calls over his shoulder, snagging his jacket on his way out. "I'll see you-"

"Hey, Rick." He pauses, his hand on the door, his head tilted in acknowledgment and his eyes alive with inquiry. "Thanks for today."

That little boy smile that has her heart uprising into a treacherous flutter that tickles along the cage of her ribs graces his lips, sparkling shimmers of gold through his eyes like her father's lake on a sunny day.

"Pleasure was all mine, Kate," he replies, unlocking her front door and drawing it open. "Until tomorrow."

Beckett watches him go, listens to his footsteps resound down the hallway once he's eased her door shut, the work of the elevator taking him downwards, and she sighs, moves to gather her belongings to go meet Vikram.

"Until tomorrow."

* * *

Rick Castle feels giddy exiting her apartment. It's strange, this eagerness - he doesn't think he's ever experienced the effervescent emotion before - fizzing through his chest like champagne bubbles, his heart so buoyant. Their date had been interrupted, his chance of finally kissing her dashed, but the smile on her lips was imprinted on his brain, the subtle flush of her cheeks, the mold of her hips beneath his hands seared into his palms. He may not have kissed her, but he had evoked happiness from her tonight, something that was once so rare arising on multiple occasions in a single evening to bloom across her lips and spark through her eyes.

He could make Kate Beckett happy, he could love her, he – shit. He could love her.

The insistent hum of his phone within his jacket pocket startles him from the realization, the terrible and wonderful strike of knowledge, and Rick withdraws the device, presses it to his ear without thinking.

"Castle."

"Agent Castle, why is Captain Beckett on her way to meet me right now?" Vikram questions, cool and collected as always, but with exasperation infused into the inquiry.

Rick blinks, sucks in a breath of the chilly night air to clear his senses, break through the foreign haze of wonderment Kate has unknowingly induced. "That was you who texted her?"

Vikram sighs. "Yes, Castle. It's my job to lead Captain Beckett to dead ends, but it's yours to keep her from even wanting to travel the pointless roads I send her down."

Castle grits his teeth, the plastic casing of his phone creaking under the brutal clench of his fingers around the device. He hated this, fucking hated to remember that she was an assignment, that none of it was real. It was supposed to be a job, he was _supposed_ to distract her.

Not daydream about what it would be like to love her.

"Yeah? Well, I was doing fine with my part of this job until you interrupted," he grumbles, stalking the rest of the way to the nearest subway stop, pausing above the steps to avoid losing service.

"Consider it a test, a progress report to present to my boss. So far, Agent, you're failing."

Rick pinches the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger. "Thanks for the update."

"Do better next time, Rick. If you don't, Captain Beckett won't have a next time, got it?" Vikram quips.

Castle growls and lifts his eyes to the night sky, the cloudless blanket of black overhead. "Loud and clear."

"Good. Now, I gotta go. Your girl will be here any minute. See you tomorrow, Agent Castle."

Rick presses his thumb hard to the screen, ending the call with enough force to crack his screen if he wasn't careful, and shoves the device into his back pocket. The problem with LokSat - and all associated with the apparent mastermind - was that they underestimated Kate Beckett. He's been following her around for a month and it's crystal clear that she doesn't go down without a fight, will never let anything interfere with her quest for justice. He doesn't stand a chance, but he'll continue to coerce Vikram into thinking he does, into convincing whomever is in charge of LokSat that he has Kate wrapped around his finger - oh, she would kill him for even _thinking_ that sentence - to keep her alive.

He'll play whatever role he has to and hopefully, keep his suddenly greedy heart out of the equation.


	6. Chapter 6

Castle doesn't show up for work the next day and she's surprised by how much it disappoints her, how it leaves a tiny hollow space in her chest that bothers her from morning to night, how absolutely ridiculous it all has her feeling.

She shouldn't miss him, especially when it's only been a _day_.

But when he fails to appear in the precinct the next day as well, not hearing from him in nearly 48 hours, she approaches Vikram with concern in the conference room.

"Hey Vik, have you heard from Castle?"

The head of their digital investigation team lifts his head from the laptop he has open, his fingers pausing over the keys.

"Ah, yeah, he called in this morning. Pretty sure he's come down with something," Vikram shrugs, dividing his attention between her and the computer screen. "Don't worry, Captain, I'm sure he'll be back by tomorrow."

Kate scoffs, hopes that Vikram can't hear the slight strain that comes with forcing the sound. "He can stay away for as long as he'd like. Actually gives me a chance to concentrate without him loitering outside my office every fifteen minutes."

Vikram pauses in his resumed typing to shoot her an amused look, his eyebrows quirking with his lips, and she frowns in response.

"What?"

"Oh nothing. Better go take advantage of this Castle-free day."

Beckett scowls at him and turns in the doorway of the conference room, drifts towards the break room to retrieve her own cup of coffee for the first time in too long. God, Castle has been spoiling her, making her soft, and that was highly unacceptable.

And so are her barista skills.

She had been used to the bitter sludge they brewed up in the precinct on a daily basis before he'd shown up, but now her taste buds have become acclimated to the overpriced lattes he had made a point in bringing her every morning. Beckett curses him and the cringe-worthy flavor of her morning coffee, frowning around the rim of the cup, tossing the contents into the sink and abandoning the idea altogether.

Kate shakes her head and strides back to her office. She should take Vikram's advice, take advantage of a Castle-free day and tackle the daunting loads of paperwork accumulating atop her desk, and ignore the stupid surge of longing his lack of presence evokes.

* * *

Castle texts her later that evening, while she's still in her office, reading over forms, recovering from the draining conference call she'd had with 1PP, the meeting with Gates earlier that afternoon.

 _Apologies for the absence, Captain. I've been a bit under the weather. Hope to see you tomorrow._

 _RC_

Beckett rolls her eyes at the words illuminating her screen, the too formal apology and how he signs his initials as if he's writing her a letter, ever so dramatic.

Part of her wants to reply, accuse him for his day late notification. She was his boss above all else and normally, she would penalize an employee for skipping out on work without checking in with her. She wanted to tell him that too, dig into him for the poor communication skills.

But she places her phone face down on her desk instead, scribbles her signature at the bottom of the final form left in her last stack, and sighs in relief, at the slight sense of accomplishment. Never enough, though, especially not when LokSat was still in the picture.

Meeting with Vikram the other night had been a waste of time, time she would have rather spent kissing Castle – yeah, she's just exhausted enough to admit it – but instead, she had holed up in an abandoned strip club, studied test results on the heroine from the Vulcan Simmons raid, and stumbled into yet another dead end.

No progress was being made, she was no closer to unveiling LokSat than she had been three months ago when she and Vikram had teamed up to delve into investigating the organization, and she's tired. She's tired of dead ends and wild goose chases, tired of the permanent target on her back that she will never be rid of at this rate, tired of living like a ghost.

The only time she feels like… like _more_ is when she's with Castle and that irked her. She doesn't need a man, a relationship, to feel whole and she doesn't think Rick could fill such a large hollow either.

Kate rubs at her eyes and buries her face in her palms, attempts to soothe the budding headache at the forefront of her skull with deep breaths.

But he definitely made her feel less empty and that in itself was something no other had been able to accomplish since her mother had died.

Rick Castle was worming his way through the cracks in her walls, embedding into her heart like a damn parasite, a parasite who's infused her with hints of light that eradicated some of the darkness that so often consumed her, spurts of happiness that felt almost foreign after so long, and it terrified her, to let someone in again, risk her heart being broken. But maybe… maybe he was worth it.

* * *

Rick enters the precinct gym with the anxiety he's been nursing over the last couple of days heavy in his stomach, restlessness a thick weight on his shoulders. He crosses his fingers that the space will be empty this early in the morning so he can get a real workout in, but he can hear the pound of fists into a bag as he trots down the stairs, the grunts of exertion from the boxer that's pummeling it.

Oh, and he recognizes that voice.

Castle ventures further into the gym to see Kate drenched in sweat, her hair damp and her skin glistening as her fists fly into the bag, the connection of her knuckles to the worn leather resounding through the otherwise empty room.

Huh. Even better than an empty gym.

"Need someone to hold the bag for you?"

Kate's eyes shoot upwards to find him sauntering towards her, trailing down to assess the workout gear he wears, and she arches an eyebrow in greeting.

"Stalking me, Rick?" she breathes, but there's a quirk to the corner of her mouth, like she's pleasantly surprised to see him here, like she wouldn't mind too terribly if he joined her.

Damn, only two days away from her and he'd missed her. Crazy to think he wouldn't, that the space from her would help when it'd only made things worse.

"Always, Captain," he tosses back with a wink that has her rolling her eyes.

"Not so much these last couple of days," she points out, curving her brow at him in silent question. "You disappeared."

Castle tilts his head to the side, his own brow rising in curiosity now. "Sounds like you missed me."

She laughs, loud and incredulous, as if the notion is preposterous. "In your dreams."

"Every night," he tosses back without missing a beat. "But no, I'm actually here for the same reason as you. Though, I wouldn't mind switching up my routine."

"Oh yeah?" she grunts, landing another impressive round of punches to the battered bag swaying beneath the pound of her fists. She's so strong, the toned muscles of her arms working with her quick series of movements, the sinewy lines of her body he can easily trace with his gaze beneath the plastered fabric of her t-shirt to her skin on perfect display. "Talking about sparring?"

"Is that an invitation?" he quips, dropping his gym bag by the edge of the mat, stepping onto the cushioned flooring when Kate takes a step back from the punching bag. He watches the column of her throat ripple with the water she sips, two long, slow swallows, and resists the urge to bounce on the balls of his feet to expel some of the tension winding through his veins.

"Could be," Kate muses, placing her water bottle back on the row of lockers, under the flow of central air to remain cool. "If you think you can handle me."

Castle scoffs, plays up his arrogance as she drifts towards him on the mat, her hands on the juts of her hipbones, her lashes dark feathers dusting her cheeks when her eyes fall to his mouth. And if anyone is playing anyone here, Kate Beckett is most certainly playing him.

"Well?"

Rick drops his own gaze to caress her face, lazily sweeping his eyes along the glistening skin of her cheeks, down to the flushed flesh of her neck, her chest. Gorgeous. "Do your worst, Captain."

* * *

Beckett grunts, the air rushing from her lungs when Castle pins her to her back for a second time, the heat of his breath skating across her throat, and throws her hand to the surface of the mat, taps out in surrender.

"That's two for two," Rick pants above her, his body dripping with sweat that mingles with hers, his chest heaving with exertion. They've been at this for over an hour now and to say she was impressed would be an understatement. "You're a very good opponent, Beckett."

She growls at the patronizing tease of his voice, his mouth just a breath away from brushing the slash of her jaw. She needs to catch her breath, get her heart rate back under control, but he's smirking down at her, so damn proud of himself, and Kate hooks her leg around his thigh without warning, flips them over.

His back smacks into the mat, their legs in an almost painful tangle that restricts her from rising to her knees, his limbs locking to prevent her victory and keeping him from his own.

"You're not so bad yourself," she grins, pinning his wrists above his head, his pulse beating out a riot beneath her palms, matching the frenzy of his heart sealed tight between their chests, and oh – she can feel every part of him like this. "Tap out, Castle."

"No way," he murmurs, his eyes flicking up to meet hers, electric blue and flashing with challenge. "I'm going to figure a way out of this hold."

Kate clenches her thighs around his, listens to him hiss in surprise, maybe a hint of pain as well if the ripple of his muscle between her knees is any indication.

"Yeah?"

"Okay, maybe not," he concedes, but he still refuses to submit, to tap the mat or verbally forfeit. "I'm quite a fan of having you on top of me, though, Beckett."

She huffs, slides her hands upwards to splay her palms flat atop his, thread her fingers through the spaces of his digits.

"Especially after the other night," he continues, his voice lowering an octave, his hips wiggling beneath hers, and she grits her teeth, ignores the shivers of heat sparking through her bones and sloshing through her abdomen. "You were going to kiss me."

"I was n-" Her protest trails into a gasp, her world spinning as Castle manages to roll them over, pressing her down into the padding of the mat beneath her back for a third time. "Asshole."

He laughs at her, but it's more soft amusement than pompous arrogance, and Kate sighs as he lifts on his elbows, frees his legs from the iron grip of hers, but stalls in his rise from the hovering position above her body.

"Admit it."

She scoffs, places her feet on the mat and bends her knees, prepared to shift from beneath him, but Castle returns his chest to lie against hers, his heartbeat straining to meet hers once more, and there's something about the broad wall of his sternum kissing her breasts, the bones of his ribs slotting into place with hers, that has her eyes fluttering shut.

"I have no problem saying how much I had wanted to kiss you," he muses on, his voice light, but weighed down by the thread of wanting laced through his words, the lust that drenches them. "Having you so close - it's intoxicating, Kate. Why I couldn't show up for two days."

Her hands flex beneath his, their palms still clasped, and she bites her bottom lip as she forces her eyes to open, faces the midnight pools staring back at her, dousing her in heat.

"Even now, you smell like cherries," he comments and her lips curl beneath the pin of her teeth. "Beneath all the sweat of course."

"Castle," she chuckles, arching her hips without thinking, biting back a gasp at the fist of his hands crushing her fingers, the drop of his head to her shoulder. "Vikram said you had a stomach bug."

Rick huffs, his lips grazing the tendons emerging along the side of her neck. "I just told him I wasn't feeling well, to pass along the message."

"Mm, he failed." She shivers beneath the exhale of his breath, unable to control it this time, and slips one of her hands from beneath the layer of his, fists her fingers in the fabric of his shirt stretched across his back. She wants it off, wants to feel the burn of his flesh beneath her palm, the slick skin of his back. "Castle-"

"Uh, Kate? I hate to interrupt…"

Beckett jerks beneath him and Castle immediately rolls off of her, all the way across the mat by the time she sits up, scrapes a hand through her damp hair under the scrutiny of Lanie's gaze.

"Like I said…" the M.E begins, the smug smile on her lips growing as Kate's cheeks burn red, the heat migrating to sear her ears. "I hate to interrupt whatever's going on down here, but you said you wanted those reports as soon as possible and the boys told me you were in the gym-"

Beckett clears her throat and pushes to her feet. "I'll be right up if you want to meet me at my desk."

"Sure, honey. And maybe then, you can introduce me to this man here. Mr. Castle, isn't it?" Lanie grins wickedly, stalling on the steps with the files pressed to her chest.

"Hi," Rick chuckles, handling the awkwardness far better than Kate was, gracefully rising to his feet and approaching Lanie with an outstretched hand. "Richard Castle, newest digital investigator for the NYPD."

"And apparently, Beckett's sparring partner?" Lanie assumes, accepting Rick's hand and offering him her usual firm shake.

"Something like that," he returns with his charming grin that elicits the urge to step between the two, smack him on the shoulder or wipe the smile from his mouth with the nip of her teeth, the invasive sweep of her tongue. "Nice to meet you, Lanie…"

"Parish. M.E," her best friend fills in before she releases Rick's hand once he nods, allowing him to turn and start towards the men's locker room with one last winning, infuriating smile tossed over his shoulder. Lanie waits mere seconds before he disappears into the room to snag Kate's gaze with her arched brow and knowing smile. " _Girl_."

"Lanie," Beckett warns, but the M.E lifts a hand in supplication, already climbing the steps to ascend back to the homicide floor.

"All I will say, Kate Beckett, is that I better be getting the juicy details later."

Beckett rolls her eyes, snags her water from atop the metal lockers and takes a thorough swig before heading for the women's locker room right next to the men's.

"What juicy details are you going to spill about me, Beckett?" Castle calls from the tile filled room of shower stalls, his question bouncing off the walls and causing the mortification searing her cheeks to burn brighter.

Kate huffs, detours into the male bathing area and stalks up to the shirtless man who'd been waiting on her.

"None, because there aren't any," she quips, poking him in the bare chest. "And there are none for you to spill either, so don't even think-"

Castle huffs and catches her offending finger before it can stab into his sternum again. "I would never. So please, feel free to keep me your dirty little secret, Captain."

"You're incorrigible," she mutters, shaking her hand free of his grasp, but Castle grazes his palm along her shoulder, traveling to cup the damp skin of her nape. "Rick-"

"You have to go, I know," he nods, not a hint of disappointment in his voice, his features. "And I apologize, for putting us in a rather compromising situation out there."

Kate smirks, hooks her fingers in the band of his sweatpants. "You're not solely to blame there."

"Mm, but I'll take full blame if you'll plan another date with me. One where we can watch that movie like you'd suggested," he murmurs, retracting his hand from her nape, must have caught on by now that she doesn't like to be touched during more serious moments, especially by him. Makes it so much harder to think clearly.

"Fine," she states without deliberation, watching his brow arc in surprise. "I'll check my calendar, let you know."

He beams at her, the seductive charmer of a man gone, overwhelmed by the delighted little boy that sometimes emerges when his joy bursts through. It's a rare sight, one she's grown to adore, relish in, and Kate elevates on the toes of her sneakers, stains a whisper of a kiss to the apple of his cheek to appease the longing stirring through them both.

He'd had a point earlier, his confession about staying away to maintain control ringing true; it was no longer an _if_ when it came to Richard Castle. It was a _when_.

"See you upstairs."

* * *

Staying away from her for 48 hours had been a bad idea. He had hoped the brief reprieve from her presence, the break from this 'job' of distracting her and the conflict it brought him, would do him good, return him to his spy state of mind. But from the moment he had joined her in the gym, from the second he felt her skin beneath his hands as they sparred, her body beneath his on the floor – he knew any hopes of rational thinking had left him.

And the smile he witnesses bloom across her lips, so delighted by the sight of the travel mug of coffee he prepared for her, now sitting on her desk when she walks into her office to meet with Lanie after her shower, confirms it for him.

He's hopelessly tripping into something he refuses to call love with her. Not yet, too soon, and not while he's – he's this, a spy out to trick her. She deserves better than that.

"Hey lover boy," Vikram greets, entering the conference room they share and dropping a file onto the surface of the table where Castle sits. "I must say, well done."

Rick's brow knits in confusion as he spares a glance to the other man already striding across the room, placing his laptop at his post near the only window the makeshift office offers.

"What are you talking about?"

"I underestimated you, but I think I was wrong. Captain Beckett was bummed the entire time you were out these last couple of days," Vikram chuckles, his fingers already clacking across his keyboard. "Smart move there, making her miss you."

"I wasn't-"

"It's a good thing, Agent," Vikram cuts him off with a narrowed gaze over the lid of his laptop. "She likes you, which means you have power over her. Use it."

Vikram didn't wait for a response and Castle had no intentions of giving him one, the bile in his throat rising to burn at the back of his esophagus, elicit a sting in the corners of his eyes.

He didn't want power over her, to use her, he wanted – fuck, he just wanted _her_.


	7. Chapter 7

The bullpen is on the brink of suffocation when he arrives at the Twelfth the next morning, the air so tense that his shoulders immediately stiffen as he exits the elevator. All of the officers are in a huddle around the murder board and he slips in next to Vikram, catches a few snippets of the briefing Kate gives from the front of the crowd.

Her words are clipped, her voice strained with exhaustion and strangled with stress, a severe contrast to the soft, airy tone he had listened to for over two hours last night, when he failed to end what was supposed to be a brief phone call. Their simple task of planning another date, a movie night at his place, expanding into late night conversations about her favorite books and his favorite travel spots when she'd mentioned discovering a brilliant bookstore in Europe. He'd told her stories about his time studying abroad in multiple countries, deadly missions that nearly stole his life at times transformed into innocent college experiences that she had accepted with intrigue and commentary that had him wishing he could fly her away to foreign countries. He wanted to see the world through Kate Beckett's eyes instead of the cynical shade his profession had cast over every city he stepped foot in.

"What do you say, Beckett? Paris this summer? Rome in the fall?"

She had scoffed at him, of course, her eyes rolling without a doubt. "Sure, Castle. If you really think you can get me to agree to traveling to another continent with you, we'll tour Europe in a few months."

She had been teasing him, no true intention of flying to foreign lands with him, but that hadn't stopped him from staying awake for an extra hour after their call had ended, browsing through summer flights and rental houses, planning a hypothetical itinerary that would never come to exist.

"What's going on?" Castle murmurs without taking his eyes off of the captain. That tension he had felt walking into the room sits heavily on her shoulders, sharpens the angles of her jaw and the bones of her cheeks, but her eyes are alight with a grim determination nonetheless.

"Some serial killer they've dealt with before is suspected to be back in the area," Vikram reveals without interest, nodding to the whiteboard Castle can barely catch a glimpse of from the back of the crowd. "Calls himself 3XK. Remember the two victims from yesterday, a couple of days before that? The blondes?"

"Ashley Sullivan and Cassie Rowe?"

"Yep. Apparently, strangling blonde women to death is this guy's favorite past time," Vikram nods, a little too chipper for Castle's liking, but there hasn't been much he's liked about Vikram since he met him.

"But how do we know it's the same guy? Not a copycat or another killer entirely with a similar M.O?"

Vikram tilts his head towards Beckett.

"After speaking with Dr. Parish and receiving results from the lab, we've learned that the fibers of the rope used to strangle the latest victims match those used in the Triple Killer's last three attacks that have spanned over the past decade," Beckett explains, pointing with her marker to a photo of the green and white nylon tacked to the board, the victims Castle had learned about over the past couple of days hanging below, a string of other women he's never seen tallying up a total of eight victims. "3XK seems to be back after four years and there must be a reason. His M.O hasn't been altered this time around, so let's assume that he's working under the same clock. Three murders, one week. Based on Cassie Rowe's time of death, we're already into day three. We need to move on this, people."

A hum of agreement ripples through the assembly of officers and Kate disbands with the rest of them, her stride purposeful as she returns to her office. Castle abandons Vikram to follow, slipping inside her workspace at the last second before she can close the door.

"Not now," she sighs, scraping a hand through her hair, and up close, he can see the lines of stress that branches out from the corners of her eyes, the worry that brackets her frowning lips. She looks like she hasn't slept in days, her concealer failing to erase the darkening shades of purple beneath her eyes, and Castle shuts the door behind him.

"I missed the beginning of the briefing, when was the last time this guy hit our jurisdiction?"

One of her eyebrows arches, something like approval flickering beneath the exhaustion in her gaze, and Kate nods her head towards her desk, snags the open file and allows him to read it over her shoulder.

"We don't have a legitimate name, but he seems to strike here every four years. Last time was the closest we'd ever come to nailing him. I was still a detective, on a team with Ryan and Espo, and we were certain we'd caught the real killer," she explains, rubbing at one of her temples with her fingers, and Castle resists the ever present urge to touch her, to work the knots from her neck, soothe the headache he can imagine stirring through her skull. "We had a confession from the wrong man who'd made a deal with the real Triple Killer. By the time we figured it out, though, Tyson had knocked Ryan out cold, stolen his gun, and we've had practically nothing to go on since."

"Wait, Tyson?" Castle repeats, plucking the photo he remembers from the top corner of the murder board, paper clipped to the file in her hand, but he doesn't recognize the man in the picture.

"Jerry Tyson," she nods, a scowl on her lips as the name slips past. "But I'm sure within the last four years, he's changed his name, his face. Our chances of stopping him are just as slim as they were last time, but we have to give it our best shot." Kate takes the photo back from him and snaps the file shut, drops it on her desk. "He's already destroyed too many lives."

"We'll get him this time, Kate."

"I don't need a platitude-"

"It's a promise," Castle corrects her, some of her fiery determination spreading into him, racing through his system like wildfire. "I'll go talk to Vikram. Now that we know what we're looking for, _who_ we're looking for, we'll go back over everything. Where are Ryan and Esposito?"

"With CSU at Cassie's apartment. I've been working on establishing a connection between Ashley and Cassie all morning, but aside from their hair color, there's nothing."

Beckett pinches the bridge of her nose and Castle glances over his shoulder, the bullpen a buzz of activity at his back, before he cradles the sharp juts of Kate's elbows in his palms, circling his thumbs over the bones. To his surprise, she lists into him, her eyes fluttering closed and her chest expanding with a deep breath.

"There has to be something this guy left behind. It's been four years, he's got to be rusty," Castle murmurs, his lips skimming her forehead, but Kate only shakes her head in reply.

"Yeah, but he slipped up last time. What are the chances of that happening again?" she mutters, her lashes tickling his chin as her eyes open, her brow scrunching. "We had our chance four years ago to stop this bastard-"

"Four years ago. It's in the past now, all we can do is catch him this time around," Castle reminds her, squeezing the muscles of her biceps. "What if you go over it with me, just me, from start to finish right now?"

"Castle, I've already-"

"I told you, I missed the beginning of the briefing," he reminds her with a shrug, sidestepping her to plop down on the couch. He snags the pillow with the embroidered gun stamped into the front and rests his elbows atop the cushioning, looks to her as if he's awaiting story time. "Really, what do you have to lose?"

Kate sighs and reopens the folder, retrieves her notebook from the desk, her case notes, and starts from the beginning.

* * *

Two hours of theorizing gets them nowhere, but it does inspire Beckett to take a trip to Sing Sing, to meet with 3XK's old partner, Marcus Gates, for a second time. Of course, that brings her back to square one when the convict tells her nothing she doesn't already know. Tyson is a genius in the worst way, a mastermind at disappearing, and at this point, it's only a matter of hours before he vanishes again.

Rick is waiting for her at the Twelfth when she returns later that afternoon, a steaming cup of coffee on her desk, and she musters a smile for him. He had surprised her that morning, the determination to catch Tyson burning bright in his eyes, matching hers, and it almost has her wishing he had worked alongside her back in her detective days. He wouldn't have made a bad partner.

Not that she'll _ever_ tell him that. She'd never live it down.

"Nothing?" Kate inquires, casting her gaze to Vikram's setup across the bullpen, but the tech analyst is gone for the day by the looks of it.

Castle hesitates, but shakes his head. "But the boys are going through everything again and we still have time. Cassie was killed yesterday morning, Ashley two days before that, so we have at least twenty-four hours."

"Going off of the assumption that he'll stick to that timetable," she sighs, collapsing into her chair and burying her fingers in her hair. Her head feels as if it's about to explode, she hasn't slept more than three hours a night since this case picked up and her sinking suspicions about the Triple Killer's return had arisen. But there is no time for rest, not when another woman's life was on the line.

She squeezes her eyes closed, wills the dull throb reverberating through her skull to cease.

"Kate, you have to sleep." Castle's hand touches her shoulder, the warmth of his body at her back, and the deliriously exhausted part of her wishes that she could lead him over to the sofa, cuddle into his side and find rest against his chest. And that dangerous thought is enough to convince her that he may be right. "At least for a couple of hours."

"I can't afford to sleep right now, you know that."

"There's an entire taskforce working on this case," he reminds her, curving his palm over her shoulder. "You're giving it everything you have, but you're no good to anyone when you're dead on your feet. Go home, take a shower, have some real food, and crawl into your own bed for a few hours."

"You make it sound so easy," she mumbles, shrugging him off, but the idea of standing, following his advice and allowing herself just a few hours away from the case, is beginning to take root in her mind.

"It's never easy." His voice is steady, even, and yet… heavy, as if he knew her struggle all too well. Was journalism really so emotionally taxing on him? "Whatever you decide, let me know if there's anything I can do."

Kate watches him exit her office, a reassuring half smile on his lips before he strides across the floor, back into the workroom he shares with Vikram, and she finds herself rising from her desk before she can approve the decision. She gathers her things, tucking the file into her messenger bag, just in case the urge to go over it, the spark of a lead or an odd sock she missed, comes to her before her return.

Beckett leaves her office, meeting Castle's eyes as she locks the door, and nods her farewell when she starts towards the elevator, patting Ryan's shoulder on the way. The man who carries most of the guilt on his shoulders, that night in the motel where Tyson had slipped through his fingers forever haunting him, turning him cold.

"Get some sleep, Kev."

"I'll sleep when Tyson's behind bars," Ryan mutters, his eyes never leaving the murder board, and she doesn't try to sway him.

If Castle thought she was stubborn, she challenges him to test Ryan under these circumstances.

"I'll see you again in a couple of hours," she says instead, receiving no response. Her phone buzzes as she steps foot in the elevator, a message from Castle that she opens once the doors have slid closed.

 _Call me if you need anything, even if it's just to talk. Otherwise, sleep well, Captain._

She's relieved she's alone in the lift when her lips curl in a soft smile.

* * *

Castle spends an hour in the workroom after Beckett has finally gone home, his private laptop opened on the table, using what little access to CIA resources he had on the device to bring up anything he could on Jerry Tyson. If his father attempted to come down on him for it – though highly unlikely – Castle would just call it part of his current mission, which isn't necessarily a lie. Catching 3XK would help Kate, helping Kate would coax her into wanting him around, and sticking close to Kate is his mission, ergo, so is catching this asshole, Tyson.

Two hours of research brings him nothing, though, confirming that this man was a force to be reckoned with. He could always request reinforcements from the CIA, but he doubts the director would approve it, and something tells him Kate would kill anyone from the alphabet soup who strode into her precinct attempting to take over her case. No, better to leave his connections out of this one.

Besides, he'd dealt with worse than Jerry Tyson; he could find this killer on his own.

But he saves the side mission for tomorrow. Tonight, he intends to swing by Kate's apartment, without her knowing, check on her from the vacant apartment across the street that he's used for previous surveillance, and head home, follow some of his own advice and indulge in a handful of hours to sleep. And hopefully, he'll manage to arrive back at the precinct before Kate.


	8. Chapter 8

She falls asleep in the bath, waking to cold water and pruned skin, the bubbles gone and her body exposed and shivering in the cool air. Kate hauls herself up, rolling her neck to alleviate the threat of soreness, and wraps the towel around her body. She hadn't slept long, the bath offering her the opportunity for nothing more than a fifteen minute doze after her small meal of leftover pasta that she'd found in the fridge, and once the water drains and Kate tugs the oversized t-shirt past her head, she's ready to drift back into slumber atop her mattress.

But the second she crosses the threshold into her bedroom, the hairs on the back of her neck stand straight, prickling with awareness. She doesn't breathe, scanning her eyes over the room, lit by the glow of a single lamp on her nightstand, seeing nothing out of the ordinary, out of place, but the feeling of being watched doesn't leave her.

Kate tiptoes out of the adjoining bathroom, goosebumps spreading along her bare skin as she moves silently for the bed, for the clothing she had stripped out of before her bath. She reaches for the holster that carries her gun.

Empty.

"Don't move, Detective Beckett." Her blood runs cold. "Or should I refer to you as _Captain_ now?"

Kate spins slowly on her heel to see Jerry Tyson in her bedroom doorway, her gun in his hand, aimed at her chest with his finger on the trigger. To her surprise, his appearance is ultimately unaltered, his face still the same, and it almost causes her dread to intensify.

If he's ignored the opportunity to change himself, to blend into society rather than hide from those who could recognize him, reveal him, then he was more than confident enough to commit a murder tonight that he would walk away from without worry.

"Long time no see, right?"

"Tyson," she mutters, taking a step forward, but he tightens his grip on her gun. "You're making a mistake."

"Oh no, Kate. You don't mind if I call you Kate, do you?" he grins, the wicked curl of his lips causing her stomach to twist. "The mistake was made by you, your team. I thought it'd be fitting to kill you first, you know? Let your people find you strangled in your bed, naked and vulnerable like this. Then I'll kill Detective Esposito, and finally, my old buddy, Detective Ryan. After his wife, of course. That pretty blonde is right up my alley."

Rage simmers in her chest, but she tamps it down. Her safe in the office holds another gun. She has no idea how she could lure Tyson out of her room, how she would manage to unlock her safe and retrieve her weapon, but she would figure it out. 3XK liked games, all she had to do was play along.

"But I'm not," she points out, quirking her brow at him in challenge. "Since when does your M.O include brunettes?"

"Don't flatter yourself," he chuckles, the smile still strung across his lips. "You and your boys ruined all of my careful planning four years ago, remember? No good deed goes unpunished."

The gun remains raised, but Tyson lowers one hand to his waist, retrieves a lasso of rope from his belt.

"But you and Esposito, you're not all that important. It's your friend, Kevin, who's going to suffer the most. Well, that little girl he has too. She'll be an orphan once all of this is over… maybe I should take her under my wing. What do you think, Kate?"

"Go to hell," she bites out, her nails cutting into her palms.

"Just a word of advice, fighting prolongs things," he states, the rope unfurling at his side. "It'll be easier for both of us if you let me finish it quick."

Tyson comes towards her and she jerks back, bumping into the nightstand, but there's nothing atop the wooden surface she could use to defend herself, nothing but her bare hands, and she swallows past the harsh throb of her heartbeat in her throat, her ears, and braces herself for a fight to save her own life.

"You're going to make this fun for me, aren't you?" Tyson smirks, a foot away from her, and Kate growls, prepares to lunge for the man.

But Rick Castle beats her to it.

She doesn't even witness him enter the room, not until Tyson is being forcefully spun around and Castle's fist is connecting with the other man's face. Beckett doesn't hesitate, surging for the gun, but Tyson slams his elbow backwards the second her hand grazes his wrist, the sharp bone connecting with the middle of her sternum, knocking the breath out of her in a harsh rush.

Kate loses her balance, stumbles into the bed just as the gun goes off.

" _No_ -" she gasps as Castle grunts, staggers, and Tyson shoves him into her dresser, the gun still in his grasp as he turns, the rope slinging towards her neck. Tyson charges her, uses the impact of his weight to pin her down, both of them crashing onto the edge of the mattress, but Kate still manages to jerk her knee to his groin in retaliation. He growls at the pain, but his grip on the rope, the gun now pressed to her temple, doesn't release.

She's choking within seconds of the rope tightening around her neck, her airway shrinking, closing up and sending bursts of blackness through her vision, until he's managed to cut it off completely, and no matter how hard she flails, writhes and hits and jerks, Tyson refuses to relent.

"This works out even better," he gets out, tightening the noose around her neck, impossibly tight, and Kate kicks out, the bone of her knee connecting with his hip, but Tyson doesn't flinch. "I'll just pin this entire thing on your boyfriend, murder suicide. Buy myself more time."

Kate's nails cut into her own skin as she reaches blindly for the rope, scoring the flesh of her throat.

"Until I'm done here. Then I'll keep killing, all because of y-"

Oxygen rushes down her throat, her chest heaving with it as the blur of Tyson's body flies across the room, a yelp of pain resounding through her bedroom. The jarring slam of a body into the wall, the crack of a fist connecting with flesh, knuckles with bone, and Kate scrambles for the gun that still rests beside her head.

She staggers to her feet, the rope still dangling around her throat like a necklace, and breathes through the tremble of her body to raise her weapon, aim at the man Castle has pinned to the wall.

"Castle, move!" she croaks. He follows her command without pause, landing one final blow to Tyson's face before slipping out of Jerry's grasp, allowing her a clear shot to the chest.

Tyson's body goes ramrod straight, his eyes beady and wide and standing out amidst the crimson that stains his features as he crumples onto her bedroom floor. Kate finds it hard not to follow as the room begins to spin, but Castle is already there, easing the gun from her stiff fingers and wrapping his arms around her waist to support her as she collapses.

"I've got you," he whispers, his voice a brutal contrast to all she had just witnessed, to the dead man he had pulverized with his bare hands mere seconds ago, the same hands that touch her with such tenderness now.

"How?" she rasps, clinging to his shirt to remain upright, pressing her forehead hard against his clavicle to force the dizziness to stall. "How'd you get in here, Castle?"

A violent cough wracks her chest, shreds her abused vocal cords, and he dusts his fingers to the back of her neck.

"I called you, when you didn't answer, I got a little concerned," he explains, his thumb brushing back and forth over the thud of her pulse. "The door was unlocked."

Kate takes a slow breath through her nose and peels her eyes open, her lashes skimming his clavicle. "You nearly killed him."

"He nearly killed you." He says it as if he needs no other explanation, as if it's completely normal for an NYPD tech analyst, a retired journalist with no listed combat training, to beat another human being to a damn near bloody pulp. It's the least of her concerns at the moment, but it doesn't add up.

Nothing adds up with him.

Kate manages to lift her gaze, but Castle's eyes are on the angry red skin of her throat, the concern shading his eyes a troubled dark blue. She unfurls her fingers from his shirt, grazes her hand up his arm, but freezes at the hot spill of blood she encounters.

"You were shot," she remembers aloud, her voice hoarse and sprinkled with horror, her heartbeat picking up again as she cuts her gaze back to him, takes in the pale quality of his skin. "Castle, here, sit."

She eases him onto her bed, intentionally away from the spot where Tyson had nearly asphyxiated her, and begins to peel the shirt away from his chest.

"Captain Beckett, I've dreamed about this moment," he teases, throwing her a winning smile that she rolls her eyes in response to. "The cops should be here any minute now. Texted Espo the second I stepped inside, heard Tyson talking to you."

She breathes a sigh of relief, smart man, but it hitches before it can leave her lungs, the bloodied mess of his shoulder demolishing the brief sensation of reprieve.

"It's not that bad," he attempts to placate her and Kate scoffs, leaves him on the bed to return to the bathroom, grab a dry towel to press to the wound. He was right, she's able to gauge that the wound is most likely through and through as she attempts to clean some of the blood from his skin, the bullet missing the bone, may even be nothing more than a graze; she can't tell amidst the river of blood. He'll be okay, but he had been ready to kill for her, die for her, and _that_ was far from okay.

Richard Castle was not allowed to die for her.

"Don't ever do something like that again," she whispers, pressing the towel to the bullet torn flesh, watching his jaw square with the grit of his teeth.

"Can't - promise you that, Beckett," he gets out, the knuckles of his fists turning white against the resting place of his thighs, and god, those are swollen too. His entire body brutalized.

"Castle-"

He touches her cheek, trails his fingers down her skin until they're trickling down her neck, curling at her nape.

"I'm just glad you're okay. All that matters," he murmurs, the smile waning on his lips, and he's so maddening, so frustrating and challenging, and so good to her. Kate steps between his knees, cups his cheek in the hand not applying pressure to his wound, and bows forward, resting her forehead to the refuge of his, brushing her lips to the gentle curve of his mouth.

He goes still, frozen beneath her until he tilts his head upwards, meets the tentative touch of her mouth, and Kate finally stops finding reasons not to give in and kiss Richard Castle.

* * *

His shoulder is alive with pain, engulfed in the familiar flame of a gunshot wound, but Kate Beckett is practically straddling his lap, her tongue painting the seam of his lips, pulling a groan of pleasure from his chest as he opens for her, is finally allowed to learn the intoxicating taste of her. They're both battered from the battle with Tyson, heartbeats of pain in his upper body, his hands, but the soft pressure of her lips, the heat of her tongue stroking hard over his, is enough to eradicate every thought that doesn't revolve around her from his mind.

Castle fists his hand in her hair, angles her head just slightly, just enough to deepen their kiss, elicit a moan that strikes a match in the gasoline of his bloodstream.

"Kate," he pants, kissing her bottom lip, trailing his other hand up her bare thigh. "Kate, I hate to say this, but pants - you should put on pants before they-"

Her hips rock forward and he squeezes the silk skin of her thigh, wants nothing more than to fall to his back, let her sit astride his hips and take it from there, but there's a dead serial killer in her doorway, a majority of her precinct on the way over, and he knows how much her reputation means to her.

"Kate," he grinds out, and she sighs, smearing one final kiss to his mouth before carefully drawing back the leg she had hooked over his, her feet a little wobbly once they touch the floor.

"Keep pressure on your arm," she breathes out the instruction, backing away from him to retrieve a pair of leggings from the nearby dresser smeared with blood, pointedly averting her eyes from Tyson's body.

She changes in the bathroom, the sleep shirt she had been wearing still on her body as she emerges, but joined by a bra this time, he notes with chagrin.

Castle stands from her bed, bleeding all over her sheets, and reaches for the angry red skin of her throat, settles his palm to the side of her neck when she lets him.

"Hurt?" he murmurs, stroking his thumb down the column of her throat, pausing to imprint the whorls of his fingertip against the hollow of flesh and bone where her collarbones converge.

Beckett hums and encircles his wrist with her slender fingers, aligns her thumb to the thrum of his pulse. "Doesn't hurt, just tender. Your shoulder?"

"About as good as it can be," he muses, casting a glance over his shoulder, back to her bed. "I'll buy you new sheets."

She huffs a quiet laugh, draws his hand from her throat, but keeps hold of his wrist. "I'm not letting you buy me bed sheets, Castle."

The boys are bursting through the door before he can respond to the smirk of her lips, crashing through her office and calling her name, but stumbling to a stop at the sight of Tyson, bloodied and slumped against the doorframe, at the sight of their boss and the precinct's tech guy shirtless in her bedroom.

"Beckett?" Esposito states her name like a question, both of her lead detectives dividing their gazes between the two of them, lingering on Castle's bloodied shoulder.

Kate drops his hand.

"Is there a paramedic on the way up?" she gets out, her words still strained, choked, and Rick watches Ryan's eyes ripple with knowledge, revulsion as he casts his gaze to Tyson's dead body. "Tyson shot Castle."

"And nearly strangled her," Rick points out, fisting his hand atop his thigh to resist reaching for her, touching her, the urge a constant now, hardly repressible after finally knowing the sensation of her mouth on his.

"We got paramedics on scene," Espo assures them both, holstering his gun. "What the hell happened here?"

"Castle was worried," Beckett begins, scraping a hand through her tousled hair. "Came by to check on me when I didn't answer my phone and Tyson was - he-"

"He was trying to kill her," Castle fills in on a mumble, swallowing before nodding to the abandoned rope on the floor, snaking between the space of the bed and Tyson's dead body. "I struggled with him until Captain Beckett was able to take the shot."

"Damn Castle," Esposito comments, lowering to his haunches beside Tyson's figure and assessing the brutalized state of the killer's face, the blood still wet on his flesh where Castle's knuckles had broken the skin. "You beat the shit out of this guy."

Rick averts his eyes to the wall, an untouched piece of her bedroom decorated with small frames of artwork, and feels Kate shift in closer to his side, a pillar of support nudging against his arm.

"Probably the only reason I survived," Beckett states, the backs of her fingers grazing his, but not twining, not in front of the boys.

"Why'd he come after you?" Ryan demands, quiet and so confused as he flicks his gaze back down to Tyson, unable to look away for long. "I was the one he went to the trouble of stalking a few years back. I thought-"

"He was saving you for last," Beckett explains on a sigh. "He wanted to kill Espo and I first, make you suffer as much as possible. He came after me because I was vulnerable, here all alone, you haven't left the Twelfth since this case reemerged."

"Never should have told you to go home," Castle mutters, lifting his uninjured arm to push his fingertips to the socket of his eye, press down until he sees stars of white bursting behind the lid. "Not alone, not when-"

"Rick," she snaps quietly at his side, her voice hushed but reproachful, and he peels one eye open to catch a glimpse of the disapproval simmering in her gaze. "Don't."

"Yeah, bro. Not your fault," Esposito chimes in, surprising him, really. It had been Ryan to offer him acceptance in the beginning, more so than anyone else; Javier Esposito had been the one to show consistent suspicion towards Castle, keeping him on his toes in apprehension that the former soldier would be able to figure him out. "None of us predicted that Tyson would have the balls to show up at any of our homes."

"I should have been able to predict that," Ryan mumbles, his mouth stretched into a thin line, his eyes a bitter cobalt. "I should have - I'm sorry, Beckett, Castle, this never should have happened."

"Kevin." Kate steps forward, but Ryan is already turning, stalking out of the apartment with Esposito on his heels, a solemn expression on his partner's face that assures Castle they won't have to worry. He knew what Kevin Ryan was feeling, could guess that Kate recognized the excruciating claim of guilt anyone in their line of work had encountered at least once, but the detective would heal, would learn to forgive himself and accept he wasn't to blame.

It would just take some time.

"Castle, you should sit. Paramedics should be up here soon, but you look like you're about to pass out," she murmurs, turning to frame her hands at his side, steady the sway his body was performing that he had failed to become aware of. Jeez, it was just a graze. When had he become so soft?

"I'm f-"

Kate tugs on the fabric of his waistband, drawing him out into the familiar space of her living room, leading him to the couch in slow, shuffling steps, and easing him down onto the soft cushions.

"Don't let me bleed all over this too," he mumbles, hunching forward, his head accidentally coming into contact with Kate's stomach where she stands before him, and he means to draw back immediately, doesn't intend to linger, he's just so sluggish, so tired. But to his surprise, Kate doesn't stiffen or push him away, her hands ascending to cradle his head, her fingers combing through his hair. Letting him rest there.

"Wasn't your fault," she states, quiet, he realizes as the footsteps of others invade the broken privacy of her apartment, fellow officers and incoming paramedics. "Not even close, Castle."

"Should have come with you," he sighs, breathing in the comforting scent of her body wash, the warmth of her skin.

"Fine," she says, her fingers curling around his ears, gently tugging his face up to look at her. "Next time you come home with me."

Her thumbs stroke the hot shells of his ears before her hands are falling away, her body drifting to the side, out of the way of a man with a medical bag trotting towards them, squatting in front of Castle. And the paramedic is talking to him, peeling away the towel that's become glued to his shoulder with dried blood, but Rick can only stare at her, the corner of his mouth quirked as Beckett smirks back at him.

* * *

She sticks close to Castle's side while he's checked out by the paramedic, sits beside him on her sofa while his shoulder assessed and treated, his fresh bruises examined, his body poked and prodded at until she has to squeeze his hand to keep him patient.

He's antsy, she's noticed, his knee bouncing, his fingers flexing within the cradle of hers, as if he just can't stay still.

"Is this the first time you've ever…" Her sentence trails, but he lifts his gaze to her, his bobbing knee slowing to a stop, much to the relief of the man patching up his shoulder. "Had to do something like that?"

Rick's eyes slip to their clasped hands, a frown claiming his lips, and knowledge flickers through her gut, fluttering up to her chest, niggling at the back of her brain. She's had ideas, theories about him and what exactly it is that he's been holding back from her, and one of them, one of the more outlandish ones, had been that he was a spy. His entire identity as a journalist with a specialty in the department of technology all a cover, but she always grew stumped when she asked the question of _why?_

What purpose did he have to lie about his career, his life? What could he gain from hanging around her and the Twelfth? Of course, it was possible he could be a plant from LokSat, but if so, he had done a horrible job of seeking information from her within the past month. To her knowledge, Rick was just as clueless about her investigation into the conspiracy as everyone else was.

So what the hell could a spy want from her?

"No." The single syllable snaps her attention back to his face, the cold blue of his eyes and pale skin of his face. "It's not."

He winces under the swab of alcohol to his ripped flesh, but he returns his gaze to her, lets her read the guilt that's always been hiding within the depths of his eyes, emerging to circle along the stark blackness of his pupils.

Castle fingers spread within the cage of hers, his index curling around her middle, pinky hooking onto her ring finger.

"Kate, I have to tell you-"

"Beckett! Thank god you're okay!" Lanie's cry of relief breaches their moment as her best friend strides into the room, his imminent confession, and Castle closes his eyes, sighs out in disappointment that Kate silently shares. "Oh, but Castle, you're not."

"I'm fine, Dr. Parish," Castle assures her, his voice so tired, his eyes reopening to reveal the stains of purple smudged beneath. "Nothing serious."

"I'll be the judge of that," Lanie announces, her eyes flicking between them both, lingering on the vibrant circle of red encompassing Kate's throat, Castle's stitched up shoulder, the twined fingers between them. But her best friend says nothing, thankfully, merely steps up beside the male paramedic at Castle's side, examines the naked flesh of Castle's shoulder and asks every question imaginable.

"I like him," Lanie had mused only two mornings ago, standing beside Kate's desk with amusement dancing in her eyes and approval smeared across her quirked lips.

"You don't know him," Kate had tossed back with a scoff, opening up the files on 3XK's past kills, what they had left of them.

"Maybe not, but I saw the way he looked at you, Kate Beckett," her best friend had quipped, causing Kate's face to reheat, the burn of embarrassment on her skin becoming permanent. "And more importantly, I saw the way you looked at him."

Kate curls her fingers inwards, tightening the knot of their hands.

"Rick-"

"Later," he promises, squeezing her fingers and holding her eyes, his burning a blue brighter than she's ever seen, determination and dread forming a worrisome combination beneath the shards of ice. "Later, Kate."

She refrains from the urge to touch her lips to the scar above his left eyebrow, another story he has yet to tell her, while the hovering medical professionals converse at his side, nods her head in agreement instead. "Later."

Later, she puts her theory to the test.

* * *

"Hey there, Chuck Norris."

Castle lifts his gaze to see her climbing into the ambulance he had been relocated to once he was deemed stable, claiming the empty seat across from him, left by the paramedic who'd wrapped his hand too tightly. Kate knocks away his fingers from loosening the straps of bandaging, adopts the task with gentle hands that soothe the crackling pain inhabiting his knuckles.

"Did they check your throat?" he asks, watching the deft movement of her fingers, the purposeful graze of her digits along his. He had feared that after tonight, after he'd beaten Tyson to near death in front of her, after she'd kissed him like he's always wanted her to, Kate would distance herself from him. Either from fear of the monster he truly was or the prospect of actually facing the fact that they had crossed a line he didn't think they could come back from. Didn't want to come back from.

But she didn't look afraid, not of him or what came next.

"Mm, no severe damage," she reports, smoothing her thumb over the adjusted bandage, now wrapped comfortably around his battered bones. "May just be sore for a couple of days. Your shoulder?"

Castle glances down to white bandaging draped over his right shoulder, the graze cleansed and stitched beneath, nothing serious.

"Barely feel it," he murmurs, adding a shrug for emphasis when she narrows her gaze on him. "Had worse."

"Oh?" Kate rises from her seat, releasing his hand to balance it atop the wall at his back so she can lean in, press her lips to his ear. "How much worse, Agent?"

His spine stiffens, a jolt of pain splitting through his injured shoulder, and Beckett withdraws only far enough to meet his eyes, hers burning an intense gold, alive with quiet anger that threatens to flay him alive, questions and curiosity that may offer him a chance of repentance.

Not good. Not the _plan_ , Castle.

"Beckett-"

"Not here," she states under her breath before he can. "We have to give our statements, then we're heading to the precinct."

"Kate." He coils his fingers at her wrist, brushes his thumb along her pulse, releases a breath when she tilts into him for the briefest of moments, rests her forehead to his and closes her eyes.

Shit, he's hurt her. They were so close, close to being… more, and now, it was probably over before it could even begin.

"Please," he lets out on an exhale, not sure what it is he's pleading for.

Kate lifts her head, scrapes a hand through her hair, but holds his eyes. And in that moment, it's a detective hungry for a lead, ready to interrogate him, earn her confession, staring back at him. "You're going to tell me everything."

He sighs, but he doesn't argue, loosening his fingers at her wrist and feeling the cold bite of the night rush in to fill his empty palm.

"Probably so."

Even if it meant losing her.


	9. Chapter 9

He's been waiting for her for over an hour in the empty conference room, knowing she would find him in the late night hour without needing directions. After they had separately left her apartment, both arriving at the Twelfth, Kate had gone straight to her office, a flurry of phone calls awaiting her, and Rick had wandered, waited patiently for his punishment.

"You're not a journalist."

Castle glances up to see her striding inside the room where he had been studying the closed case file on 3XK. He had given his statement at the scene after his time with her in the ambulance, Kate had too, her arms crossed and her head down as she had recounted the events to the officer, but it settles his nerves to read over each detail, know that it's over.

Beckett shuts the door behind her and stalks forward, calm and collected, but he sees the underlying disappointment in her eyes, the anger simmering beneath her armor. He doesn't know how she's discovered that his profession is false, if she knows anything more; she had called him 'Agent' in the ambulance, but she could simply be guessing. There's still a chance he could salvage his story before it unravels.

"You're not even real a tech analyst," she sighs, crossing her arms over her chest and glaring down at him. Normally, he hates to allow someone else this power, to stand over him and claim the upper hand, but he finds that he has little desire to take it from her.

But when Castle says nothing in reply, her frustration begins to boil and then she's leaning in, propping one hand on the surface of the table and the other on the back of his chair, so devastatingly close, so intoxicating even as she glares down at him.

"Who the hell are you?" Kate demands through the hitch of her voice, searching his eyes. "And what the hell do you want with me?"

"That's a loaded question," he murmurs without thinking and she scoffs in disgust, pushes off from his chair to straighten up again. "Kate-"

"No," she snaps when he rises, balling her hands into fists before he can even consider approaching her. "Answer me, Rick."

"What makes you think I'm lying?" he throws back, watching her nostrils flare, the vein in her forehead arising to pulse along the canvas of smooth skin.

"Jerry Tyson."

"I told you, I-"

"Lanie did the autopsy, let me study Tyson's wounds on the scene while you were in the ambulance. You knew exactly where to hit, the best places to subdue him, as if you've had training," she points out, her fingers tapping at her sides, awaiting his response, ready to combat his denials.

"Self-defense training," he murmurs, unable to meet her eyes anymore. "Told you I could protect myself in the field, Beckett."

"You've been shot before," she states, nodding to his freshly bandaged shoulder. "You knew before a paramedic looked at you that it was a flesh wound, as if you've faced one before. You - you've killed before."

"So what if I have?" he defends, mimicking her and crossing his arms at his chest. He wanted the power back, wanted the security that came with being in charge, in control of this situation, but she's already stripped him of it all.

"Too much doesn't add up and you know it," she growls, stalking towards him again, her chest brushing the fold of his arms with her surge of indignation. "You've been hiding something from me since the beginning."

"You're paranoid," he mutters, but Kate's hands reach for him, her fingers hooking in the loops of his pants and tugging hard.

"Why can't you just tell me the truth?" He knows she's using the advantage of her touch to work him, the desperate burn of gold in her eyes to chip away at the last of his resolve, demanding an answer, the truth, and after decades of training, it's ingrained in his instincts to lie to her instead, to spin another story that will get him out of this without blowing his cover. "Who are you, Rick?"

But Kate Beckett deserves more.

"I'm - I can't say what I am," he grits out, snagging her gaze, waiting for her to connect the dots on her own. "You've already figured it out anyway, Kate."

Her brow knits with confusion, but it's mere seconds before he can feel the tension lace through her bones, her muscles going rigid and the line of her mouth blanching white.

"You're… you're really a spy, aren't you?" Kate concludes on a breath, withdrawing her hands to clasp her fingers behind her neck at his nod of confirmation and directing her eyes to the ceiling. "Who sent you?" she whispers and Castle eases away from the table's edge to step towards her, but Kate shoves at his chest before he can touch her.

"Kate-"

" _Who_?" she questions, the sharp bone of her jaw threatening to quiver, the glimmer of hurt beginning to glisten in her eyes. "Are you - what were you sent here to do, Castle? And - and how much of this has all been an act?"

Rick steps closer, grateful when she doesn't place more distance between them, and takes a risk, touches his hands to her biceps and grips her tight, seeks her gaze so she can witness the truth he speaks.

"Working here at the Twelfth? That was an act. You're right, I'm not a tech analyst, or a journalist," he admits, gritting his teeth to ignore the nervous thud of his heart in his chest, bruising against the cage of his ribs. He doesn't _do_ this, doesn't reveal his mission or himself to anyone, but he had been handing her pieces since this entire ruse began, since it shifted into something more, and now… he wants to give her everything he has left. Even if she denies it all, denies him. "But, Kate, you… I wish I could say the way I feel about you is an act, that it's something fake and under my control, but it's not. If it was, we wouldn't be having this conversation right now."

Kate groans and leans back into the nearby wall, drifting out of his hold and covering her eyes with the shield of her fingers. And he shouldn't follow, should give her space, but he doesn't, he _can't_. He leans into her, knocks his forehead against hers and releases a shallow breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding when she reaches for his neck, snags her fingers in the collar of his shirt.

She opens her eyes to him, looking as if she's about to cry but he knows she won't let any tears fall.

"Tell me everything," she mumbles, her voice a gravelly rasp that grates against his heart, shreds the muscle to pieces and burns through his sternum. "You can't just - I have to know-"

"Okay," he decides, it's useless at this point to deny her, to even contemplate whatever other options he may have had left. He made his choice long ago, whether he had realized it or not, and now he has to abide by his decision. He wants her, more than a mission, and if to have even a chance with her, he has to give her the truth – then so be it. "I'll tell you all of it, Kate. Just not here. We can't do this here, too risky."

"This is my station, how is it not…" Her sentence disintegrates as understanding dawns in her eyes, slow blooming horror following. "Where then?"

"We can go to my place for now. It's the only place I can trust."

"How do I know it's somewhere _I_ can trust?" she counters, the line of her mouth brittle, her eyes alight with embers of betrayal.

Castle takes a step back, towards the conference door, and closes his fingers around the handle. "You'll just have to decide whether or not you still trust me."

* * *

She hates him. Always hated him, but oh, she really hates him now.

Lying to her this entire time, tricking her into believing the games he played, making her feel…

Damn him, he was _still_ making her feel too much. Even now, riding the subway with him downtown, she holds onto his bruised hand, her fingers protectively cradling the brutalized knuckles, bones beaten raw for her. And that had to mean something, right? The fact that he'd practically killed Tyson, not for the sake of the case, for justice, but because the man had hurt her.

He wouldn't have done that if she were nothing more than a pawn to him, would he? No matter how hard she tried to tell herself it was all a ruse, her heart continued to combat the arguments of her brain with memories of how he's always looked at her, how he's touched her, all he's given and taken. She's aware that CIA operatives are often forced to go deep undercover, become different people for the sake of a mission, but not everything can be faked. She has to believe that.

Castle flexes his fingers in her loose grasp, curling his brittle bones weakly around hers to lead her off of the train once it slows to release its few passengers onto the Prince street platform. 4 a.m. doesn't offer quite as much foot traffic for them to maneuver through and Kate follows him up the stairs to the streets of SoHo, sticks close to his side as they walk in silence.

It's been silent since they left the precinct, his eyes hard like sapphires that won't meet hers, downcast like the frown carved into his lips, causing him to look so much older than she's ever seen him. More evidence, her eager heart supplies to her distressed mind, more evidence that _you_ _mean something to him._

He begins to slow when they stride down Broome street, his pace quick and efficient throughout the entire five minute walk, almost difficult for her to match, and she watches him reach into his jacket pocket with his good hand, retrieving a set of keys.

"Doorman is a plant," he mutters suddenly, his cold lips at the shell of her ear as they draw closer to a massive building she's passed by plenty of times before, admired. He's been hiding in plain sight this whole time? "I know you're not my biggest fan right now, but it would help us both if you could pretend to be accompanying me home voluntarily until we reach the elevator."

Castle's arm slides around her shoulders before they can reach the front of the building, stiff and uncertain, and Kate shakes her head, shifts deeper into his side and hooks her arm at his waist while they cross the street together.

"This is voluntary," she informs him, craning her neck to scrape her teeth at his jaw, punish him a little even as they put on an apparent show for the brute manning the building's entrance.

"Not how it should have been," Rick sighs, that suave smile she knows all too well plastered across his lips as they enter without issue, receiving nothing more than a nod from the doorman. It falls away the second they step inside the lift, his arm slipping from her shoulders the moment the doors slide closed.

Kate lets him go, her brow furrowing, and leans back against the wall of the elevator, too tired. She's too tired for this. "How should it have been?"

"Should have been our next date, watching a movie together at my place," he reminds her softly, his eyes on the floor, his arms crossed over his chest.

"How fake were those? The dates."

Castle's gaze cuts to her, a combination of surprise and hurt in the dulled grey of his irises that shouldn't get to her, shouldn't do anything to her conflicted heart, but it twists the muscle harshly, causes her chest to physically ache.

"Not fake at all," he growls, fisting his fingers around the keys still in his left hand, the metal ridges digging into the meat of his palm. "The night we officially met, I won't lie and say there wasn't motive there, but I could have essentially done what was necessary just by working for you, Kate. Pursuing you further was a personal choice. Obviously, a bad one on my part."

The elevator doors part and Castle glides out into the hall, leaves her propped against the polished wood paneling, gaping at him before she's striding after him with her blood sizzling beneath her skin.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

Castle shoves his key into the last door of the hallway, pushes it open once the tumblers successfully click into place.

"It means that I'm sorry." Kate slams the door behind her, forces her attention to remain on the man in the foyer of the extravagant loft, shedding his jacket with grit teeth and flickers of pain rippling through his eyes before he finally maneuvers the material from his arms. "I'm sorry that I ever took this mission, that I met you, that I hurt you. I'm sorry for wanting you-"

"Stop it," she hisses, surging towards him until she's standing in front of him once more, a breath away from touching him. "I don't need apologies, I need answers, R- Agent Castle."

His gaze darkens, thunderous, storm clouds spreading across his face.

"I know about LokSat," he states, his voice cut and dry, emotionless, and she thinks that scares her more than the words that just came out of his mouth. "My father is my handler and he was contacted by whomever is in charge of the operation. They requested an agent to be placed inside the Twelfth, to stop Captain Beckett from digging further into their case than she already had. A last ditch effort to steer you away from it for good before they took care of you themselves."

Her heart is pounding, loud and fierce through her chest, rattling the cage of her ribs and rushing blood through her ears, her mouth too dry to form words.

"They gave me a rundown of your history and I just - something about you… I didn't know you, but I wanted to, wanted you to live. So I accepted the job, didn't think it'd be too hard to keep you away from it. But I underestimated you, just like they have." Castle scrapes a hand through his hair, takes a deep breath before he snags her gaze, holds it with an intensity that spears straight through her. "I want to help you, Beckett. If we work together… I don't know who's behind LokSat, it's above my clearance, but we'll figure it out and we'll stop him."

Hope flares bright and true through her damaged chest, restores the steady rhythm of her heart from its crazed frenzy, but Kate shakes her head, forces herself to think this through before jumping at the chance to take advantage of his offer, of him.

"No, Castle, that's completely going against your assignment," she argues, but Rick doesn't appear the least bit bothered by the dilemma.

"LokSat aided the man who had your mother murdered in getting away with it. If that's the kind of people my company associates with, I don't want to be a part of it anyway," he states, his jaw set, decision made. "And don't worry, from this point on, it will be completely professional."

Kate's lips part, a protest already prepared to fall free, but Castle's drifting past her, towards the living room that is arguably bigger than the entirety of her apartment.

"I have all the files here, you can go over them and then we-"

"Castle." He glances back over his shoulder, his expression heavy with sorrow he fails to conceal, eyes still glittering with guilt, and this wasn't how it was supposed to go. She hadn't expected him to just give up, let her go without a fight. She hadn't wanted him to. "All the stories you told me… how real were those?"

His throat ripples with a swallow, but he turns back around, ensures that she can read his gaze, find the honesty in his eyes.

"All real, just edited," he explains with a shrug that elicits a wince. "Childhood was all mostly accurate, but college was Langley not NYU, traveling across the world has been for missions, not a journalism career. I've played a lot of roles for the sake of this job, Kate. Told a lot of lies, but with you… I didn't want to."

Kate abandons her place in the foyer, alone and with her feet planted to the hardwood, approaches him even as she can see the visible apprehension it strikes through his frame. "Why?"

Castle looks away from her and she drifts in closer, touches his arm and feels his resolve begin to break, the tension begin to melt beneath her fingertips. So much power she has over him, a trained spy, it hardly makes any sense.

"You deserved better and I-" He pauses and she waits, doesn't rush, and when his response finally comes, it's in a whisper, a breath of a confession that she has to strain to catch. "I wanted it to be real."

Castle's eyes have fluttered shut in shame before her and she's relieved, grateful he doesn't witness the way his words crash through her. This man… he had lied to her, but she fears he may love her too. That it may be enough to override the stab of his betrayal, cleanse the stain of his deception.

"Rick," she breathes, cradling his sullen cheeks and watching his eyes peel open as she drags him closer.

"I'm so sorry," he gets out, shaking his head within the trap of her hands, his own flexing at his sides, resisting the urge to touch her again. A habit she's grown to recognize. "I'm sorry, Kate, I'm-"

"I know," she sighs, quiets him, and it goes against every instinct she has not to stalk out of his apartment right now, hide away and nurse her wounds in private. He isn't forgiven, not yet, he knew that without her having to speak the words, but she _wanted_ to forgive him, to regain that tentative trust that had been built between them. She wanted him, too. "You have a lot to be sorry for."

His jaw squares, accepting the responsibility of that, the lack of sympathy she shows him. But she knows Castle isn't seeking sympathy with his apologies. He's seeking her forgiveness, yes, but also a way to make it right, to fix the wrong he's done. Offering to platonically assist her in the LokSat investigation, use his insider knowledge to give her the upper hand, doing his best not to touch her even though the yearning she had tasted on his mouth only hours earlier zips through his frame, buzzes beneath her fingertips.

It's not enough. She will need so much more from him and even then, it will be an uphill battle for them both, but she had wanted him before she knew the truth. She had wanted the opportunity to explore what it could be like with him, once the sparks of attraction bloomed into a long lasting burn and the walls between them were no more than rubble at their feet.

"But Castle," she murmurs, ignoring the uneven beat of her heart hammering in her chest, the raging apprehension through her stomach, and embracing the surge of the flame that has existed from the moment they met, finally spreading into an all consuming fire through her system as he stares back at her, eyes so apologetic and wide, patient and broken, and so very blue. "Don't ever apologize for wanting me."


	10. Chapter 10

His lips part in surprise, speechless, and Kate arches on her toes, the cup of her palms to his cheek holding him still as she presses her mouth to his, feels his entire body exalt at the touch of her lips. His hands hesitate for only a moment longer before finally ascending to spread along the plates of her shoulder blades.

His mouth is hot, fusing effortlessly with hers, tongue painting the seam of her lips with reverence, seeking repentance when he slips past the weak barrier. And he's just so needful, desperate in how he kisses her, worships her, but equally as gentle, careful with her as if she had been the one to suffer the pierce of a bullet.

Kate's hips cant into the cradle of his, the sound of his moan shooting an arrow of heat through her abdomen, his chest stuttering where it's crushed against hers, ragged heartbeats and panting breaths sealed together. She's aware of his shoulder as she laces her arms around his neck, twining her fingers through his hair at the scale of his lips along her jaw, his mouth open at the taut stretch of skin just below the angle of bone, suckling at the riot of her pulse.

"I want to work together," she gasps, her body thrumming with need that gentles beneath the seal of his forehead to hers, the soothing splay of his palms beneath the wings of her shoulder blades. "And I want - I want other things, with you. But Castle, you have to promise me-"

"Anything," he's already murmuring and she strokes her fingers to his unshaven cheek, soothes some of his desperation and her own. "I'll give you anything. Everything. Whatever you don't already have."

Her breath shudders out of her. Shit.

"No more lies," she states, forcing her eyes open to snag his gaze, finds him already watching her with his attention sharp, a piercing shade of blue that shows her everything. There had always been a layer to him that she couldn't quite peel away, an iron curtain that hid his secrets, pieces of himself she was not allowed to see. Not yet. "About anything."

Castle nods, deadly serious and without hesitation, that curtain gone, everything laid out raw and open for her. "Okay, deal. But that goes for both of us. No more secrets."

She doesn't argue. Of the two of them, he had obviously been the one to put forth the most dishonesty, harboring half-truths, but just because she hadn't blatantly lied to him about anything didn't mean she wasn't guilty of keeping secrets and she could own up to that.

It would be nice, for once, though, to not hold back on anything with someone, to dive in completely.

"It's a deal," she rasps, swallowing hard against the worsening soreness of her throat, catching Castle's attention, igniting a wave of concern through his eyes.

"I know you probably want to go over everything immediately, but I could make you some tea first," he offers, daring to quirk his lips for the first time all night, a pitiful attempt at a smile that scrapes at her heart.

"That'd be great, Rick. Thank you," she whispers, but she doesn't let him go, lowering her arms from his neck to circle loosely around his waist. He watches her with curiosity, with apprehension and nerves, and a form of fear that she's seen arise faintly once or twice, full fledged now. He was afraid she was going to leave.

Kate drops her head to his clavicle, closes her eyes and times her breath to the steadying pound of his heart, allows some of the tension strangling her spine to loosen its grip as Castle's uninjured arm wraps around her shoulders, the other elevating to cradle one of her elbows in his palm.

"I do want to go over everything," she admits on a mumble, her voice not equipped for much more at this point. "But I'm exhausted and I know that you must be too."

"Oh, yeah, of course. I could take you home or to Lanie's, if you-"

"This gorgeous place must have a guest room," she interrupts, hooking her thumbs in the back belt loops of his pants, subduing her smile as his breath hitches with understanding. She shouldn't be smiling, not after everything that occurred with 3XK, not after learning the truth about Castle, and yet…

"It does," he confirms, circling the jut of her elbow with his thumb, his lips dusting the crown of her head. "You're more than welcome to stay there, or you can take my room if you'd rather be downstairs, whichever you want is-"

"Guest room upstairs is fine, Castle," she assures him, rubbing her knuckles along the base of his spine to soothe some of the nervous energy. There was no point in walking on eggshells around her, not now. She's always had the horrible habit of lingering in the past, allowing it to consume her, drive her, like picking at a scab and never allowing it to heal. Instead, all her wounds continue to bleed, but with him, she only wants to look forward, to let the raw spot heal over.

"Did you - I can let you borrow some clothes to sleep in," Castle suggests, his gaze flickering down to assess the pantsuit she had slipped into before she had exited her apartment. She hadn't expected to need a packed bag when she'd left, but she probably should have.

Jerry Tyson had tainted her home with his unwelcome presence and she wouldn't let the trepidation last, wouldn't let a serial killer ruin her love for an apartment she's adored for over five years now, but it would take her a while to become comfortable there again. And Castle's guest bedroom seemed like as good a place as any to stay in the meantime.

"Yeah, please," she murmurs, drawing her hands up to splay across the sides of his ribcage as he takes a reluctant step back, lingers for a moment too long before staining a kiss to her temple and starting towards an entryway that opens into an office.

Kate drifts after him, curious to see the layout of his lavish home, the opposite of what she would have envisioned.

"Hey Castle?" He stops in the doorway, turning his head over his shoulder to lift his brow at her in question while she catches up to him in the spacious office, dusts her fingers along the walls constructed of bookshelves, jammed with what has to be hundreds of novels. "What's a spy doing in a SoHo loft?"

A laugh startles out of him, relieved and a little hysterical, like he had expected a far more complicated question.

"Not to burst your bubble, but a tech analyst and journalist combined couldn't afford a place like this," she points out, following after him when he continues through the office, nudges open a second doorway that leads to – oh, his bedroom.

"No, they couldn't," Rick chuckles, tugging open the top drawer of a dresser placed against the wall adjacent to the king size bed in the middle of the room. "Honestly, I hadn't come up with a way to explain this to you yet. My father and some other agent, probably North, his second in command, picked out the place."

"No interior decorators in the CIA?" she muses, trailing her fingertips along the bare walls of his bedroom. For a man with such a vibrant personality, she hadn't expected his personal space to be so bland. No art on the walls, no knick-knacks or picture frames on the nightstand, even the bedspread a boring shade of midnight blue and plain white pillows that lacked covers.

"I had intended to try and decorate before I brought you here," he admits with a sheepish grin that is still too wary for her liking, folding a t-shirt over his arm, but he shifts nervously on his feet, not even trying to hide the language of his body or mask it with feigned arrogance anymore. "But other than that… making things personal, it's never a smart idea. The more personal it is, the more memorable, and - memorable doesn't work well when you're usually a ghost."

He doesn't look at her while he says it, withdrawing a pair of sweatpants for her, but his brow is knit, tugged down like the troubled frown on his lips, and Kate drifts deeper into his room, past him to ease down onto the edge of his bed.

The mattress was a little too soft for her liking, but it was comfortable. The entire loft lacked the personal touches of the man living in it, but as long as Castle was in the apartment with her, the place definitely held the charm and appeal of comfort.

"What about now?" she asks, staring up at him as he turns, the clothes draped over his forearm and confusion muddling his gaze. "I think you've made it quite personal with me, Agent Castle. Definitely pretty memorable."

Rick lifts his arm to rake his fingers through his hair, a bad habit that sets the locks in a state of disarray, and hisses at the flare of pain that must spike through his shoulder at the thoughtless movement.

"Unless this isn't personal for you, of course," she hums, challenges, secretly pleased by the fire it ignites in his eyes.

The lights are off in his bedroom, the glow from the office lamp the only illumination aside from the spill of city lights through the slits of slated blinds concealing the windows, streaks of white and gold staining the skin of his arms, his throat and jaw, as he comes towards her. Castle drops his clothes into her lap, skims his left hand along the line of her jaw, suffuses his fingers in her hair, that confidence she knows well slowly beginning to return and ridding him of the awful apprehension that was already beginning to drive her insane.

"How many other women have you seduced for information?" she continues, the blue flames of his irises crackling with tamed indignation, bolts of electricity flashing through his pupils.

"Seduced? A few," he admits, shrugging his good shoulder, circling his thumb along the back of her skull. "But there's a difference between coaxing information out of a person, using them as a means to an end, and making it personal. Tell me, Beckett, which do you think happened with you?"

Kate bites her lip and swallows, refuses to wince at the lick of fire her saliva elicits as it sluices down the raw passage of her throat, and scoots back on Castle's bed instead, forcing his arm to stretch, hand still tangled in her hair, and his knee to dig into the edge of the mattress between both of hers.

"Mm, I'd hope option two. Especially since you didn't get much information out of me."

"Oh yeah?" Castle tosses back, placing weight onto the knee balanced between hers, and Beckett curves her palm to the back of his thigh, feels his muscles ripple beneath the curl of her fingers. "I think I got plenty. I know your favorite color, your order at Remy's, where you went to college, that you have a tattoo I've yet to see-"

"Not the kind of information you came searching for," she corrects, ignoring the flutter of delight the pride in his eyes evokes, how proud he is just to know useless facts about her.

"No, better," he counters with a grin, skating his thumb along her scalp to caress the sensitive flesh behind her ear. "Kate, I want you to know-"

"You don't have to," she starts before he can, whatever it is he plans to say that has the teasing glimmer fading from his eyes, the serious expression overtaking it. She's drained, too drained to hear anything more, anything that could break her.

"There's never been anyone like you," he says it anyway, his eyes like summer skies, cloudless and blue, clear and endless. "And you are so… this is so very personal to me."

His hand falls away from her hair, tripping down her throat to graze her shoulder before he draws it back to his side, but Kate catches him by the wrist, clings to his metacarpal bones like a lifeline.

The tenderness in his eyes breaks her just as she'd feared, the accompanying need cracks her chest wide open, all of her jagged pieces exposed, vulnerable to his greedy hands, welcome to decimate her further. Or heal her, soothe the sharp edges and lessen the emptiness that consumes so much of her.

He's hurt her, sprinkled embers of anger through her system with his betrayal, but… it's harder than she would have expected to hold onto the pang of heartache, the simmering fury that fades further with every glimpse of his fingertips to her skin. She's been drowning for so long in death and conspiracies, in Loksat and even her career at times, but since she had met Rick, keeping her head above water, inhaling deep breaths of fresh air, had become so much easier.

It would take time, but she wanted him badly enough to get over being hurt.

"How much does your shoulder hurt?" she whispers, tugging on his left hand, his good side, watching his body sway towards her but feeling him resist. "Rick-"

"Not - not too bad," he murmurs, his right hand rising to snag her fingers when they toy with the bottom button of his shirt. "Kate. I wasn't - this isn't-"

The lower half of his shirt fans open, allows her fingers the opportunity to steal beneath the fabric, spread along the taut planes of his abs, the muscles contracting beneath her palm.

"Too soon," he husks, but his eyes have screwed shut, his brow threaded with concentration, with the willpower to pull away from her, and maybe he was right. Maybe it was too soon to take this step, but it's one she's been aching to take for quite a while now, and despite it all, she doesn't want to wait anymore.

"I want to," she breathes, more buttons of his shirt coming undone.

"Your throat, you're - I'll hurt you, make it worse-"

Kate fists her hands in the open ends of his shirt, his chest now bare and exposed to the cool air of the bedroom, the hot strokes of her fingers, and holds on as she descends to her back on his bed, giving him no choice but to follow.

"You can't make it worse," Beckett promises, no longer sure if it's her injuries they're talking about.

"Fuck, I've already made it worse," he grunts, supporting his body above hers with only one of his elbows, but lowering his head to dust his lips along the red line marring her neck, following the column of her throat with his mouth.

"Then make it better," she gasps, hooking one of her legs around his thigh, closing her eyes at the utter of his moan, the vibration of the sound against her skin.

Castle collapses atop her, controls the collision of his body into hers, but Kate still arches at the fit of his hips, the weight of his chest over hers, the pressure of his carefully controlled want between her legs. It's not his first time on top of her, but this was so different from a sparring session in the gym, so much better with his lips on her skin, his hand roaming her side to slip under her shirt, his touch painting brushstrokes of heat that sear through her flesh.

She's careful when she pushes the edges of his shirt from his shoulders, the bones rolling beneath her palms as he maneuvers the fabric from his torso, shrugging it from his left side with ease. He has to pause with his teeth grit at her jaw to breathe through the work of removing the right side from his arm, exhaling with relief as her delicate fingers assist, guide the dress shirt past his elbow so he can slide the material from his body.

She dusts those fingers along the bandaged curve of his shoulder, lets the digits trickle down the path of his arm, the impressive bulge of his bicep, the solid length of his forearm.

"Still not too bad?" she whispers, watching the travel of his eyes above her, his gaze caressing with every blink as he skates it along her body laid out beneath him. God, he hadn't even seen her naked yet and he already looked so awestruck, so enamored and adoring of her.

She doesn't think anyone's ever looked at her the way Castle does. Not even close.

"Not bad," he confirms, coaxing her body upwards on the bed, her head finding rest atop a pillow that smells strongly of him.

She would need to flip them over soon, eliminate the strain that hovering above her like this places on his injured shoulder, but for just a few seconds, she relishes in the sensation of Castle pressing her deep into the mattress, his body draped atop hers and his mouth descending to sip from her lips, rich and soft and so addictive.

Kate cradles his face to keep him there, brushes her thumbs to the corners of his eyes, abrades her fingertips on the line of his jaw rough with stubble, absorbs the warmth of his skin and fervent race of his heart against hers. Too good to give up.

* * *

"You feel so good," she mumbles against his jaw, grazing her lips along the hard line of his bone, touching her tongue to the dip of his chin. "Really good, Castle."

"Kate," he breathes, feeling his heart pounding, certain she can hear the thunderous roar from beneath his ribs as she presses a kiss to his bottom lip. The objective of his mission had been to distract her, gain her trust and redirect her focus from her hunt for LokSat, and he was succeeding. Well, for a single night, he was kind of succeeding, even if there was no longer a mission goal to work towards. He had her body crushed against him, her tongue teasing at the corner of his mouth, but he didn't want her to be an objective, a task to mark off his list, he wanted… he wanted Kate Beckett, wanted her in every way possible, and he wanted her to know, so badly wanted her to know every last truth he had left- "I just want you."

Kate's eyes flutter open, her lashes lifting to tangle with his, and he cups a hand to her cheek, cradles the slash of bone, the rise of her gentle smile in his palm.

"You have me."

He was falling in love with her.

No, it was worse. He was in love with her, tangled and at risk of drowning with no chance of getting out.

Fuck. This was _bad._

Kate's mouth opening beneath his provides beautiful distraction, the haven of her body welcoming him closer, drawing him in deep, wiping his mind clean of everything but her and the heat of her flesh searing through the barriers of their clothes, the noises falling like a symphony from her lips.

Growing louder as he travels down the length of her body, peels the clothes from her skin and touches his mouth to every inch of exposed flesh, nipping at the quivering muscles of her abdomen, feathering his lips between her breasts, and questing along the warm canvas of her body until he returns to the altar of her mouth for worship, moaning at the velvet crush of her lips, the warm stroke of her tongue.

"Don't stop," she gets out, her breath hitching with a gasp, the wings of her lashes threatening to flutter closed at her cheeks, but Kate fights to keep her eyes open, on him. "Castle, please-"

"I can't," he groans out, panting hard against her cheek, catching his breath before he returns to the refuge of her lips, smudging a kiss to the corner of her mouth, her jaw, her neck. "Can't stop with you."

Kate mewls beneath him, her hips rocking upwards, her knees clamping hard at his waist, and then she's rolling them over, effortless and impressive, her body landing atop his in a graceful straddle that has the slosh of arousal through his system spilling over.

He swallows back a moan as she rises over him, her skin bare and glorious in the soft light of the city's glow, the golden shards of the lamp stretching to reach the bed. Gold like the shimmering pools of her eyes, glittering above him, lighting her face enough for him to catch the gentle twitch of her lips as her spine curves, bowing over him until she can reach his mouth once more.

Kate's lips brush his when she speaks, sparks of electricity that surge through his veins as the single syllable falls from her mouth onto his. "Good."


	11. Chapter 11

She wakes less than two hours later to the heat of Castle at her back, framing her, overheating her. Kate pushes up on her elbow and scrubs at her eyes, glances to the digital clock he has on the nightstand, the sole item to decorate the set of drawers. Nearly four in the morning and she feels as if she's been completely devastated, her body aching and sore from the fight with Tyson, aching and sore – the good kind of sore, the kind she hasn't felt in a while – for other reasons that actually have her smothering the match of heat the thought lights within the depths of her abdomen.

It had not been the plan to sleep with him. Well, not so soon, anyway, but despite the uncertainties she still harbored, the split second of apprehension that bursts through her chest, she can't bring herself to regret ending up in his bed.

Not when he had worshipped at the shrine of her body with such reverence, so much need in every touch of his mouth, caress of his hands and grip of his fingers, every ripple of amazement through his eyes that had haloed his pupils in a ring of gold each time their bodies came together.

Sex with Richard Castle is fantastic, she hadn't expected anything less, but what they had done mere hours ago… it had felt like more, almost too much.

Kate eases from beneath the drape of his body at her back, the careful curl of his injured arm around her waist, and slips to the edge of the mattress, rising from the bed with her toes popping on the cold, hardwood floor. She snags his dress shirt from the floor as she tiptoes towards the office, shrugging on the fabric as she enters the room and hooking a couple of the buttons into place while she heads for his kitchen.

Her throat is on fire, punishing her for the lack of care she had shown the abused tissue. He had mentioned tea earlier, before she had changed the course of their evening plans, but water will do, anything to soothe the painful sensation of sandpaper scraping up and down her larynx.

It doesn't take her long to find the glasses, only three in total arranged in the cabinet above the sink, and Kate shakes her head in gentle exasperation, a hint of amusement, as she fills the cup with water from a filter she locates in the fridge, also quite barren. Too similar to her own, more similar than she would have expected.

Kate presses her back into the corner of the counter while she takes a slow sip of the water, wincing through the shock of cold spreading along the heated interior of her throat, sharp and biting before the chilled liquid eases some of her discomfort, abolishes some of the effort it takes to swallow. The paramedic had called in a prescription for her, Castle too, but she wouldn't fill hers, knew that her throat would heal within a few days, but she was starting to worry about Rick's bullet graze. He had been fine a couple of hours ago, not a hiss of pain escaping his lips, even as his arms had reached for her, clung and cradled her, but she can't imagine that much activity can be good for a barely stitched bullet graze.

Oh, what if they had torn his stitches?

"Kate?"

She glances up from her dazed study of her bare toes on the polished wood of the floor to see Castle approaching her. His eyes are still cloudy with sleep and his hair is sticking up at an odd angle on one side, pressed flat over his forehead, and she sighs, can't help it. He's endearing without even trying, especially like this, rumpled with sleep and shuffling towards her.

Hard to stay angry with.

"Your throat okay?" he rasps, clearing his own as he steps into the kitchen, and Kate nods, reaches for his hair the second he's standing in front of her, combing back the flop plated to his forehead.

"Mm, just a little sore. Water helped," she explains, lifting the glass between them. "Should probably take something for your shoulder though, yeah?"

"Don't need anything," he mumbles, drifting into her touch when she cups his cheek. "Doesn't hurt."

"I don't buy that, Richard Castle," she counters, scaling her fingers to his ear to pinch the delicate shell, smirking at his grunt of surprise, his shift away from her.

"Seriously, Beckett, I don't like taking pills, especially when I don't need them," he argues, rubbing at his ear, but failing to resist at the tug of her fingers at the waistband of the boxers he must have stepped into on his way out to find her. "Besides, did you hear me complaining earlier?"

His brow wiggles, but adoration is already spreading through his gaze, ethereal in the darkness of the loft, at the mention of _earlier_.

"Better not have been complaining," she murmurs, craning her neck to accept his kiss when his eyes drift to her mouth.

Castle hums, whispering his lips along her cheek, the high angle of her bone, and draping a soft palm to the side of her neck, his thumb skating along the strip of tender skin.

"Never. Though I do feel like I'm not at my best here, so I'll have to make it up to you once I'm no longer handicapped," he muses, his lips quirking once her cheek has risen beneath them. He had laid himself bare beneath her in his bed, but he still remained tentative, hesitant after his confessional from before, still seeking her forgiveness with every touch.

"I won't say no to repeat performances," she husks, her fingertips dancing along the line of his boxers, coasting to his back and tucking her fingers beneath the fabric.

"Performances? As in plural?" he quips, arching an eyebrow at her, gleeful at four in the morning, and she releases a soft huff of laughter into his mouth. "Kate Beckett, you are straight out of my dreams."

Kate rolls her eyes, but her lips spread into a grin as his hand trips down the front of his shirt clinging to her body, plucking buttons free until his palm can glide along the branches of her ribs, skimming along her spine, the curve of her ass, to coil his fingers at the back of her thigh.

Her leg automatically hooks at his calf, drawing his knee to slide between hers for support when he squeezes her quadriceps muscle, tugs her body in snug against his.

"Your shoulder," she protests, cursing herself for the breathless way the words pass through her lips, but he's pressed so intimately against her, her knee at his hip, her body cracked open for him.

"It's fine," Castle murmurs, his eyes smoldering pools of black, embers of heat the only trace of light left in his gaze.

His hips rock forward when she thoughtlessly clenches the fingers splayed atop the firm muscle of his ass, gasping at the pin of her lower half to the counter, Castle's forehead crashing against hers before he angles his head, smudges a kiss to her mouth that has her arching for more.

Rick lifts her with his good arm, his strength more impressive than she had originally thought, experienced, and she decides to trust his judgment, his threshold for pain, twines her legs around his waist and laces her arms around his neck.

They bump into the island before they can maneuver out of the kitchen, his nose nudging along her collarbone, shoving his shirt out of the way to suckle on her skin, scrape his teeth along the sharp ridge of bone until her spine arcs and they sway precariously.

"Oh, Castle - bed," she breathes, fisting her fingers in his hair, trying to control the shallow thrusts of her hips. "We need to get to your bed, or the couch, floor-"

"Can we just christen the entire apartment?" he gets out, his voice so rough and raw with desire, currents of sweet electricity sparking through her synapses, but Kate grins against his temple, seals her chest to the bare wall of his and hums at the flame of contact.

"When your shoulder's better and my throat's healed," she promises, dragging her teeth along the bone of his cheek and squeezing his waist with her thighs in impatience. "And we're both running on more sleep, less adrenaline."

Castle mumbles his agreement against her jaw, regains his balance and tightens his hold on her before migrating around the island, through the kitchen, the living area, into the office.

"Imagine what we could do at full health," he muses, his chuckle a breathless pant that stains her skin, already so undone.

Kate smirks and curls her fingers around his ears, tugs his face from her jaw to smear her upturned lips to his mouth. "I think I have a pretty good idea."

* * *

Kate's phone buzzes on his nightstand while she's in the adjoining bathroom, the sound of the sink's running water filtering in with the first glimpses of morning light threatening to bleed through his windows. Castle cranes his neck to catch a glimpse of the screen, only intending to ensure it isn't the precinct, Ryan or Esposito in need of her immediate presence, but it's neither of the options he had expected.

The message from Vikram - because he knew it had to be Vikram despite the 'Unknown' title that replaces the contact name - glares back at him, an ugly reminder in digital format of what he'd done, what he is doing to her, and his heart plummets from the high she had sent it to mere minutes ago, sinking to dwell low in his stomach.

He can hear Kate coming back and he eases back onto his side of the bed, not that – shit, they did _not_ have sides already, he just happened to end up on the left side while she had claimed the right in the few hours they spent sleeping.

"Hey, your phone buzzed," Castle informs her as she returns with one of his t-shirts, the one she was supposed to borrow earlier in the night, hanging on her body and skimming the tops of her thighs, distracting him for a long second. She looks so different, so wonderfully warm and soft in nothing but his clothing.

Beckett walks around the bed to snag the phone from the nightstand, propping her hip against the mattress as she reads over the words on the screen, and to his relief, rather than hiding the information, she turns to him with determination gleaming in her eyes.

"Castle," she rasps, clearing her throat with a swallow that causes her to wince and blink past the ripple of pain it brings. "I know we haven't actually discussed LokSat yet, but there's something I have to let you know-"

"Kate." She pauses, her phone gripped tightly in her hand, hope mingling with the urgency in her gaze, but he can't let her go on thinking the supposed lead her original tech analyst has sent her is anything worth following up on, can't let Vikram continue to play these cat and mouse games with her. She had learned the truth last night, the majority of his story, but she was still missing an important piece of his latest chapter. "I wasn't trying to snoop, but I saw the text on your phone. Don't go."

Beckett's brow creases in response, a natural argument rising on her tongue, before he sees her bite it back. Giving him a chance. "Why?"

"It's a trick," he murmurs, swallowing against the shame that swarms his gut every time that crushed look claims her face. He's disgusted, sickened by how many people have hurt her, used her. How he had been one of them. "You've received texts like that before, right? From Vikram?"

Kate's eyes flutter closed. "He's been playing me this entire time, hasn't he?"

The phone slips from her fingers, clatters to his bedroom floor, but she makes no move to retrieve it, opening her eyes and climbing back into his bed instead. Castle sighs while Kate crawls over him, presses her back to the headboard and directs her eyes to the ceiling.

"I'm starting to question my skills as a detective, as the captain of a precinct," she mutters, but Rick shakes his head, rethinks the movement when his shoulder sings with protest.

"Vikram Singh is a trained professional, a sociopath who works for LokSat. He had the same job as I did."

"They wanted him to seduce me too?" Kate inquires dryly.

"My job was not to seduce you, it was to distract you," Castle points out, reiterates, finding her fingers amidst the riot of sheets. "Seducing you was a personal choice."

"Consider me flattered, Agent Castle," she mutters, glancing down to the tangle of their fingers, doing nothing to stop the twine of digits and kiss of palms. "So every lead he's given me?"

"Has been a purposeful dead end," Castle concludes, blinking in surprise when Kate lowers her head to his uninjured shoulder. He's never seen her lean on someone, not physically, nor emotionally, and he wants to feel honored, privileged, but he can only acknowledge the feeling of shame, that he's played a role in breaking her this way. "I'm sorry."

"For which part?" she tries to sigh, but her breath trembles.

"All of it. When my father sent me for this assignment, I'd had no plans of taking it," Rick explains, tracing the path of her knuckles with his thumb. "I had heard of Bracken, his part in this organization before, and didn't want anything to do with it. But then Vikram gave me an entire briefing on you, and like I told you last night, I just… I wanted a reason to know you, a reason to keep them from killing you."

"Why?" she whispers, lifting her head but not meeting his eyes, diverting her gaze to his chin. "Why did you even care to begin with?"

"Because you - the world is a better place with you in it, Kate. And you've fought too hard to die."

A strangled noise slips past her lips, but she buries it in his shoulder, embeds the pained sound in his skin, and Castle turns his face into her hair, whispers another apology against the top of her head.

"I won't let them touch you," he vows, though he knows she doesn't fear LokSat, would look death itself in the eye before she backed down, and it was one of the things he loves about her, that had attracted him to her in the first place, but now… it terrifies him as well. "Let me go get the files, we'll read over everything, compare notes."

Kate shakes her head, lifts it from his shoulder with a shuddering breath. "No, we're not bringing that into bed with us."

His mouth goes dry, but Beckett is already untangling their hands, shifting away from him to move towards the edge of the bed, and Castle doesn't hesitate in following, gritting his teeth as he jostles his shoulder on his way out of the bedroom.

She strides into his living room, the streaks of sunlight streaming into the loft through the blinds he has drawn over every window dappling across her figure as she makes her way to the kitchen, straight for the expensive coffee pot – the only appliance he actually uses on a regular basis in this place.

"Kate?" he calls, shuffling into the kitchen while she pokes at the buttons of the machine with an experimental finger.

"If we're going to do this, I need coffee," she states, and Castle huffs, steps in beside her and nudges her softly with his hip.

"I'll make the coffee, you go get settled on the sofa and I'll grab the files from my safe while it's brewing," he murmurs, dismantling the top of the machine to fill it with freshly ground coffee. "I know how you like it."

Making her coffee had been something he'd found a strange sense of satisfaction in. Logically, he knew it didn't matter whether he bought her a vanilla latte at the nearest Starbucks or brewed her a cup here at the loft before he arrived at the precinct, she would enjoy it either way, but he liked putting in the work, the care into each serving of her caffeine fix. Enjoyed witnessing the line of her lips lifting into a pleased smile as she savored her first sip each morning and knowing he was single-handedly responsible for it.

Kate sighs after a moment of watching the practiced work of his hands, surprises him with the touch of her lips to his injured shoulder before she abandons him for the other room.

"I know you do."


	12. Chapter 12

She cradles the steaming mug of coffee to her chest while she studies the files splayed out on the coffee table in front of them, her legs folded beneath her on the comfortable leather of his sectional.

He isn't much further in the investigation than she is, unsurprisingly. Castle has been kept in the dark, just a pawn in a game much larger than the both of them, and what little information she had had been fed to Vikram – she will _never_ stop kicking herself for that – and therefore, passed along to the leader of LokSat.

Really, even combined, she and Castle had nothing on LokSat, but LokSat certainly had a lot on her.

A thick file including pages of information regarding her life, her career path from Officer Beckett to Captain of the Twelfth, with her time in Washington DC highlighted, notes in foreign handwriting off to the side. Details on her mother's case from start to finish in another section, her stand against William Bracken, and an in depth description of how her investigation into LokSat began. There were even surveillance photos of her.

"Who took these?" she asks, reaching out to tap a picture of her standing outside the Twelfth, striding down the sidewalk towards her car with the evening's dying light behind her.

"Most of them were taken before I was recruited," he explains, sitting at least a foot away from her, his shoulders hunched despite the strain it must place on his bullet wound, and his knuckles pressed to his mouth as his eyes roam the photos. "I followed you around about a week prior to meeting you, so I took a couple."

Kate dusts her fingertips over a picture of her at Remy's, her chin in her hand and her meal untouched in front of her, eyes downcast with her lashes hiding her gaze, skims them over another featuring her in her apartment, asleep on her couch with her arms crossed protectively over her chest and her notes on LokSat scattered across her stomach. She listens to Castle sigh as she touches one more, her in her apartment again, draped in the one shouldered, red dress she had been wearing the night she met him, tucking her gun into her clutch.

"You took these," she murmurs, splaying her fingers across the three photos. "They're not like the others, documenting my routines and locations I frequent. These are just… candid."

He has his head bowed when she glances over to him, his eyes low in shame, his fingers in a knot between his knees.

"I enjoyed watching you," he mutters the admission. "For the record, though, I did my best to refrain from watching… too much."

"How chivalrous of you," she retorts, but Castle shakes his head, winces when it drags a grunt from his lips. "Stop moving so much, Rick, you're going to make your shoulder-"

"I tried not to watch you at home, to violate your privacy like that, but you - I knew I'd never know you like that, be a part of your life, and that doesn't justify it, but learning who you were outside of the precinct…" He purses his lips, his chest rising with a sharp inhale. "It just made me want you even more, Beckett."

"Watching me pour over case files, obsessing over LokSat any second I was alone, was attractive?" she questions, curving her brow, but Castle releases a quiet sigh and the forced quirk of her lips falls.

"Your tenacity is always attractive," he chuckles, his smile rueful, heartbreaking for reasons she can't understand. "But no. Whenever you come home, it was like - like you shed your armor. That's how I've always seen you, Kate, like a warrior, you know? Every word in your file is a testament to that. You fight so hard for justice, even if it's not your own that you're seeking. Once you come home, though, it's like watching some of the weight ease off your shoulders, and I got to see the person beneath, the woman who reads mystery novels in her spare time despite how much you already deal with the genre in real life, same woman who does lengthy yoga workouts if she gets home early enough, likes cooking - even though I only saw you do it once - and painting her toes a subtle pink."

His eyes glance to her bare feet, her toes indeed a pale, rosy shade of the color, and Castle sighs.

"I'm sorry, that was all - really creepy, wow," he huffs, his ears burning red. "Your file said you already had a stalker, I didn't mean to become number two."

"It's a little creepy," she admits, relinquishing her coffee to tug her knees to her chest, prop her chin atop her patella and watch him struggle through his embarrassment. "Kind of endearing now that I know the truth. Besides, last stalker was trying to kill me. You're trying to do the opposite, so you've got that going for you."

His eyes rise to meet hers, tentative amusement bleeding through the blues, spreading through his features to twitch through his lips. He's quite a conundrum, a man of many layers and roles to play, but here on his couch in the early morning stillness of his living room, she can feel some of those layers peeling back all on their own.

He was strong and charming and confident, skilled and intelligent, a brilliant spy from what she's seen thus far, but he was also unsure of himself, conflicted and resembling a scared boy at times, and she thinks back to the conversation they had on the subway nearly a month ago. The brief blurbs of information he shared about his past, his parents' separation, and she wonders what that meant for him as a child. If he was shown the love he deserved by his father, what kind of man his father – his _handler_ – even was, or if Rick Castle had ever known the feeling of what it was like to be unconditionally loved at all.

"You're a good man, you know," she murmurs, but his entire expression ripples with surprise at the words, with disbelief that tells her too much, that causes her chest to clench, worsening when he frowns at her in response.

"You don't know me well enough to say that, Kate," he replies, turning away from her and rising with caution from the sofa, but Kate furrows her brow and prepares to follow after him.

"Rick-"

"Our lines of work are similar," he states, giving her nothing more than his profile, the glow of sunlight illuminating the bold slope of his nose, the cutting angle of his jaw, his chin. "We both take an oath, serve our countries, but I - I'm not like you, Kate. I am not always the good guy, I certainly wasn't in this scenario."

"You stepped in to stop what could have been my inevitable murder," she argues, unfurling her legs and touching her toes to the floor, but Rick is already stalking away from her, towards the barren office a few feet away. "Castle," she calls after him, wincing at the strain it elicits along the raw cords of her throat, but she ignores the nagging soreness and trails after him. "You saved my life from a serial killer last night. I don't - I don't care what you've done in the past, you're the good guy now."

His back is to her, his side swaying into the massive desk that takes up the majority of the room to prop himself up, and his shoulders shudder with a sigh, muscles rippling beneath the hooded jacket he had slid on after serving her coffee.

"You deserve better."

That stops her in her tracks, an arm's length away from touching him, and for the first time it strikes her that Richard Castle may already be in love with her.

And that terrified her.

But she doesn't flee, doesn't turn back around and return to his living room to study the useless files on his coffee table, bury herself at the bottom of a rabbit hole; she doesn't run from the realization. Not this time.

She steps up behind him and curls her palms at his hips, presses her forehead between his shoulder blades, and closes her eyes. She isn't there yet, isn't ready, but she… she could be. She could love him. She's already so close.

"I choose what I deserve, Rick," she murmurs against the fabric of his hoodie, feeling his bones shiver beneath her hands. "So, stop brooding and just accept that I want you back."

A puff of laughter rattles through his sternum and she arches on her toes to brush her lips to the back of his neck, grins at the tremor that cascades down his spine.

She wraps her arms at his torso as he reaches back to squeeze her thigh, his bare hand on her skin sparking heat in her guts, so out of control now that she knows what it's like to have him, but there's too much to discuss, to figure out, before they end up back in his bed.

"We need to talk about how we're going to continue the ruse they have me playing," Castle mumbles, his thumb skimming the taut line of her outer thigh muscle before he's retracting his hand from her flesh. "They can't know I've brought you in."

Kate nods and trickles her hands down the sides of his ribs, along the rungs of bone before shifting to take a seat on the edge of his desk.

"Should we just keep doing what we've been doing this entire time?" she asks, anxiously tapping her fingers along the hardwood corner of the oak desk. "I did work a few stints in Vice, so whatever role you need us to play, I'm more than capable of-"

"Oh, don't tell me things like that while we're trying to brainstorm, Beckett," he whines, turning on his heel to face her, his eyes immediately darkening a shade, a hypnotizing midnight hue with lingering traces of cerulean. "Especially while you're sitting on my desk like that."

"Like what?" she hums, swinging her legs back and forth, but she bites her bottom lip when Castle catches her by the calf muscle, trails his palm up her leg to cup the back of her knee.

"You're very distracting, bad for planning missions," he murmurs, his eyes darting to her mouth and back, stealing her bad habit, one she's intentionally inflicted upon him over the past month. "Now all I'm thinking about is you infiltrating some sleazy club in a really skimpy dress. Ooh, or maybe going undercover as a stripper? Bondage club in Dungeon Alley? I could totally see you moonlighting as a dominatrix."

Beckett rolls her eyes. "Castle."

"I am more than happy to let you spank me, Captain."

Her inner thighs squeeze against the muscles of his legs, nearly bracketing his hips. "Castle, focus."

"Oh, I am-"

"On how we are going to keep this change in our relationship under the radar."

The playfulness falls from his face in that split second, leaving his expression blank before an idea sparks to life in his eyes like a star exploding through the night sky. Beautiful.

"By _not_ staying under the radar," he proclaims, his brow hitching to his hairline. "My entire assignment is to 'distract you', give you something else that will consume all of your attention so that you forget all about the investigation."

"Exactly how stupid do these people think I am?" Kate questions in slight offense. Castle had said they'd underestimated her, but did they really think a whirlwind romance would completely throw her off her own mission?

"Not stupid at all," he informs her, his voice tainted with a grave quality that tugs the corners of his mouth into a thin line. "They know exactly how smart you are, which is why this was essentially their last ditch effort. These people aren't like William Bracken, they aren't cleaning house to prepare for a presidency, they're just trying to keep their secrets untouched and eliminating anyone that poses a threat to that."

"Then why not just kill me right away?" she inquires, coiling her fingers in the pockets of his hoodie at the shadows that question sends skittering across his face. "I mean, wouldn't that give them one less threat to worry about?"

"Yes, but you're pretty well-known, Kate. A highly decorated police captain and somewhat infamous public figure after Bracken's takedown. Your murder would require effort to cover up and Vikram's exact words to me were that they prefer to keep their hands as clean as possible," Castle explains, his own hands traveling the length of her arms, cupping her elbows in his palms and thoughtlessly tracing the rise of her biceps with his thumbs. "But Vikram has been giving me progress reports since this entire mission began, informing me whether or not I'm doing a good job, and apparently, they think that whatever I'm doing is working."

"So that's all we have to do then? Make them believe I've fallen into the trap and lost interest in investigating?" she murmurs, a simple solution, but Rick's brow is falling into a deep crease, his gaze growing troublesome.

"Yeah, but it's just - it's too easy," he mutters, lifting his good arm to rub his fingers at his temple, pushing away a headache by the looks of it. "They had to know that even if I was successful, it would be temporary. Your history alone proves that you would eventually circle back to avenging your AG team and hunting LokSat again."

A spring of dread coils tight in her stomach, has her fingers clenching in the fabric of his jacket. "You think they're using this as a way to gain extra time?"

"I'm so stupid," he growls, pinching the bridge of his nose. Hard. "I don't know, I have no fucking idea what they're planning, but there's no way - they're going to kill you, were always going to kill you. All I did by accepting this mission was allow them the time to fine tune whatever sick plan-"

"Rick," she sighs, shrugging his hand from her arm so she can drape her palms to his cheeks, curl her fingers at his ears and tug him down to meet her before he manages to become more worked up than he already has.

He grunts but goes willingly, his forehead colliding into hers, his lower body slotting into place between her legs at the haul of movement, but she ignores the instinctive flicker of arousal, grazes her thumb to the corner of his eye, wrinkled with stress.

"You've got to stop this, taking all the blame," she murmurs, presses her opposite thumb to his lips when they part for protest, silencing him. "You're smart, but you were just… doing your job and there's no way you could have had any idea what their intentions were. Whoever's behind this is obviously brilliant, has brilliant people working for him, and they know exactly what they're doing. But I'm not dead, we still have a chance to win this."

A sigh breaches the dam of her thumb and Kate skates the tip of her finger to the corner of his mouth, strokes the deep lines carved like parentheses into his skin, bracketing the broken fragment of his lips.

"In the meantime, we play it cool, just like you said," she reminds him. "We don't rouse any suspicion, we just let them think they're still in control while we come up with a plan of our own, okay?"

Castle inhales a fortifying breath through his nose and nods his agreement, his eyes piercing blue with resolve when they rise to snag hers.

"It needs to appear as if I'm continuing to make progress," he begins, catching one of her wrists with his fingers, circling the protrusion of bone with his thumb as if he doesn't even realize what he's doing, how he drives her crazy with such a simple touch. "Vikram will continue testing you, bringing up LokSat and promising leads just like he did this morning."

"I'll act distracted," she murmurs, nodding along to the strategy, the comforting reassurance of a plan coming together. "Like LokSat has become more of an afterthought."

"I'm sure making out with me in the precinct would go a long way as well," Castle continues, his expression serious, but the cracks of light are showing through, breaking open his smile, and Kate pinches the shell of his ear with gentle fingers just to feel him squirm.

"You're a creep," she chuckles, crossing her ankles loosely between the backs of his thighs. "We'll flirt more in front of the boys, Vikram. That's as far as it goes."

Castle sighs, but his lips remain upturned in the corners, rising higher when his gaze drifts to assess the embrace of her legs around his waist. "I can live with that. As long as those boundaries don't extend outside of the precinct."

"Getting distracted again, Agent?" she teases, cinching her legs tighter around him, using her grip on his body to draw her own up against him, stomachs brushing and chests meeting in a chaste kiss through the thin layers of clothing.

"I - yeah, a bit."

"Maybe you just need to learn some discipline," she muses, toying with the fine strands of hair at the base of his skull, twining her fingers through the soft locks, and arching her spine.

Castle moves as if to hoist her up, but Kate shakes her head, has no intentions of relocating from the desk, and watches the realization ripple through his eyes, his body already canting into the cove of hers.

"Feel free to teach me."


	13. Chapter 13

Castle holds her hand while they walk to Tribeca, their fingers loosely twined and the winter air slipping through the spaces between them. His hands are so much larger than hers, engulfing her slim fingers and small palms, but he likes it, likes that they're not a perfect fit, managing to make it work anyway.

"How many days do you think I should pack for?" Kate inquires from his side, inching closer as the wind picks up, whispers of cold air breezing past them.

He hadn't meant to be presumptuous in assuming she would stay with him from this point on, until LokSat was subdued and her life was no longer at risk, but they'd discussed it after their timeout from mission talk on his desk, after she had called into the precinct, listened to her bosses insist she take the day off and checked in with Esposito.

"Do you think my apartment is bugged?" she had asked him, anxiety climbing her spine, leaking into her eyes, and he had sighed. He really couldn't be sure unless he did a sweep of the place.

"I don't know," he'd confessed, watching her nerves intensify. "I'll check when we get there, but I doubt it, Kate."

"I don't want to stay there tonight anyway," she'd whispered, tying her hair back into a loose bun at the nape of her neck, dressed again in the professional blouse and slacks she had changed into before leaving her apartment last night, looking more like the woman he knew as captain of the Twelfth precinct. As long as he didn't allow his eyes to drift, lower to the string of bright red still encircling her throat.

She was lucky she could speak without shards of agony clawing along the length of her larynx.

"You're more than welcome to stay with me for as long as you'd like," Castle had murmured, turning his attention away from her to avoid appearing too eager at the idea. "Guest room is always yours if you want it."

She had huffed, paid for it with a wince, and stepped forward to snag her fingers in his sweater.

"I'm pretty comfortable in your room, if you don't mind, Agent."

"You're even _more_ welcome there," he'd grinned, resting his hands to her waist and squeezing her hips like he squeezes her hand now.

"As long as you want," Castle repeats, nudging her towards a coffee shop, but Kate shakes her head, continues tugging him along into the financial district. "We can stay at your place too, though. I don't want you to feel trapped at mine."

"We, huh?" she murmurs, quirking her brow at him.

"If you haven't figured it out by now, Beckett, I am not leaving you alone," he informs her with far more confidence than he actually owns.

"Oh believe me," she chuckles, bumping against his side to avoid a group of teenagers shuffling along with their heads down, eyes on their phones. "I've noticed."

"Definitely not now."

"Mm, because there are people out to kill me or because you've seen me naked?"

Castle pretends to contemplate the question, cocking his head to the side while her eyes roll in response. "Both?"

"Uh huh."

Kate releases his hand as her building comes into view, her fingers already delving into the pocket of her jacket, seeking her keys. They're crossing the street together, stepping onto the sidewalk, mere feet away from lobby entrance when the crack of a gunshot has him jerking forward.

Castle snags Kate by the arm without thinking, pressing her against the brick of the building and banding an arm around her shoulders before he seals them both to the wall, a convenient cover from any potential bullets. Vikram had shared none of LokSat's future plans, hadn't mentioned what would happen if Rick failed to complete the mission assigned to him, not that he's even talked to Vikram in nearly 36 hours. What if the plan had changed and the time he'd had left to figure out a solution was up too soon? What if-

"Castle."

He's breathing hard, the rapid rise and fall of his chest clashing with Kate's as his eyes scan for the shooter, anyone who may be watching them-

" _Castle_ , it was a car," she breathes, her fists unfurling at his sides. He had dragged her between buildings the second he'd heard the shot, shielded her with his body in the shaded space between apartments while he attempted to ensure her safety. "A car backfired, Rick. It wasn't a shot."

His heart slows at the explanation he's still reluctant to believe, until another accompanying pop just like the one from seconds before echoes from across the street, a car struggling to stay alive.

"Shit, your shoulder," she murmurs, pushing on his chest, forcing him to take a step back. "Castle, we're okay, now put your arm down before you tear your stitches."

Her mention of the injured strip of flesh has him hissing under his breath, bringing the flare of pain that spreads hot through the curve of bone, the surrounding muscle, to life, and shit, he really hopes he didn't just tear his stitches.

"Fuck, my shoulder," he grunts, listening to her huff, but he can still feel her heart thundering in her chest. "Are you okay? I didn't mean to shove you-"

"Hush, I'm fine," she promises, skating her eyes along what he's certain is the panicked state of his features. He's smarter than this, knows better than to overreact, especially in a public setting, but LokSat is after her, intending to kill her, and he doesn't even know when, how- "Rick, take a breath."

Kate's fingers rise to dust along the skin beneath his eye, drawing his attention down to the concerned gaze she stares up at him with.

"You need to sleep," she murmurs, stroking the tip of her finger to the skin he knows is stained in purple, swollen with subtle hints of exhaustion, but Castle grits his teeth to swallow it down, shakes his head.

"Not until this is-"

"No, listen to me," she cuts in, those gentle fingers drifting down to claim his chin, his attention. "We're going to go into my apartment right now so I can grab a few days' worth of stuff, then we are taking the subway back to your place and you are taking a nap, Richard Castle."

"But Beckett-"

"We are no good to each other when we're dead on our feet, you know that," she points out, dropping her hand to snag his from his side, guide him around the side of the building he had used for defense, towards the front entrance of her apartment building. "I can't have your back and you can't have mine while we're both injured and exhausted."

Castle sighs, can't actually argue with her, and since when is _she_ the voice of reason?

"Fine," he grumbles, entering the lobby with her and bypassing the elevator for the stairs that are far more reliable. "I'll nap for a few hours, only if you nap with me."

Kate glances to him over her shoulder, studying the expression of his face, searching for innuendo he's sure, but he doesn't have the energy to infuse implication into his features.

Yeah, he needs sleep.

They stroll down the hall to her door, the crime scene tape over the entrance to her home painting a frown across her lips that she tries to fight off as she squeezes his hand.

"Deal."

* * *

She has to fight him when he tries to carry her bag for her once they leave her apartment, offering to heft it over his good shoulder, earning an incredulous scoff for the proposal. The man had been shot less than 24 hours ago, but the bullet wound had apparently failed to affect his unfaltering attempts at chivalry.

Beckett leans heavily against him now, though, sitting beside him in the subway car on the short ride back to SoHo with her body pressing to the uninjured side of his, her cheek to his untouched shoulder. Seeing her apartment as a crime scene had hollowed her out, her stomach sloshing with morning coffee and nausea that threatened to surge upwards, sear the already raw tunnel of her throat on its way out.

It isn't the first time her home has been victimized by a serial killer, but walking into her living room still littered with evidence markers and the bloodstained towel the paramedic had left on her couch after treating Castle, the state of her bedroom still in disarray and reeking of powerful disinfectant that had been used to cleanse her floor, walls, and furniture of Tyson's blood - drops of Castle's as well, she's sure - had made her queasy.

Rick had helped her pack, retrieving toiletries from her bathroom for her while she plucked just short of a week's worth of clothing from her closet, piling it all into one of her larger duffle bags. She would normally fold each piece of fabric, arrange her shoes, her shampoos and lotions into plastic bags, but she had wanted out of the apartment from the moment she'd stepped inside.

"It'll feel like home again," Castle had promised her on the walk to the closest subway station, their trek down the stairs to the platform slow and calculated to avoid jostling his shoulder more than he already had today. "It'll take some time, but it won't feel like a crime scene for long."

"You speak from experience?" she'd murmured, curious to hear his answer. She had no idea of Castle's previous living arrangements, where he had resided prior to the SoHo loft that was all part of a cover.

"Mm, not really. I've never lived in a place long enough to call it home, but _if I did_ ," he'd mused, working to draw a smile to her lips, and despite herself, how deeply she did not want to smile for any reason in that moment, the corner of her mouth had twitched.

Castle touches her arm once the train slows to the next stop, rises with her to exit the car. He had wanted to get off two stops earlier, but she had managed to convince him they were safe enough to stop on the appropriate street, the one closest to his apartment. She understands his paranoia, feels it sharp and vivid within her own gut, but the likelihood of LokSat attacking either of them on a crowded sidewalk or busy street was low. They were okay. For now. She had to believe that.

"Vikram called me twice while we were underground," Castle mumbles, studying the phone in the hand not tangled with hers as Beckett leads him up the steps to street level, emerging from the tunnel onto the sidewalk busy with afternoon foot traffic.

"That a good thing or a bad thing?" Kate inquires, tugging him across the street once the pedestrian sign flares, into a building no longer guarded by the man planted by LokSat that Castle had pointed out last night.

God, how had it only been a single night since it all had changed? Less than twelve hours since she had entered the SoHo apartment for the first time, bruised and battered from a fight with a serial killer just like the man at her side, where she had sought truths, solace, and him.

"Not sure," he answers, finally glancing up at her once the elevator doors are sliding closed. "Probably wants a status report since neither of us went into the Twelfth today."

The doors part on the fifth floor and Kate takes the lead once more, his attention divided between her and the phone in his palm. She slips her hand into his coat pocket to capture his keys without him realizing, watches with amusement as his eyes startle up to her at the jingle of sound while she inserts them into his front door.

"You had your hand in my pocket and I didn't even feel it?" he gasps, his irises alight and sparkling. "Do it again."

"Maybe later, Agent," she muses, dragging him inside the foyer and assisting him in easing the coat from his vulnerable shoulder. "First, call Vikram."

Castle's brow furrows and she curls her fingers in the collar of his removed jacket to refrain from reaching up, smoothing the crease with her fingers. "You _want_ me to call him?"

"You want him and LokSat to think your current mission is a success, right?" Castle nods while she transfers his coat to the closet next to the door, a spacy enclosure that is completely bare, his jacket hanging lonely on the metal rack. "Then call him, tell him you're busy with me, that you'll see him tomorrow."

"I - okay, yeah. Good idea," he murmurs, his gaze darting back to the screen of the phone, his thumb tapping Vikram's contact. He lifts the phone to his ear and Kate drifts in closer as it rings, smirks at the confusion knotting his brow into a severe crease once again, a gasp escaping his lips when she touches the curl of her lips to his throat. "V-Vikram, you called?"

She listens to the muffled voice on the other line, fresh rage simmering in her gut. She had trusted Vikram Singh, genuinely believed that the man was on her side, working just as fervently as she was for justice. Instead, he'd been playing her the entire time, not a hint of guilt each time he lured her out to a random location, sent her down rabbit holes that she'd had to heave herself out of.

Castle nearly chokes when she nips hard at his neck and she hums in apology, hadn't meant to take her anger out on him, the taut skin beneath his jaw, and strokes her tongue over the scorned flesh.

"Listen, Vik, I'm - I'm really busy right now," he gets out, his unoccupied hand tripping down her ribcage, gliding down her back to curve at her ass, gripping hard. The rock of her hips into his isn't purposeful, neither is the familiar heat brewing within her abdomen, unfurling to spread through her bloodstream. "No, I'll - we'll discuss it tomorrow. Yeah, okay, bye."

She grins into the growl of his kiss as his phone hits the floor, fists her fingers in the front of his shirt to stop her arms from winding around his neck, placing any unnecessary pressure on his shoulder.

"What the hell was that, Beckett?" he bites out against her jaw, the husk of his voice searing her skin, igniting flames that slick along her insides from the tips of her toes where she arches to feel his mouth traveling down her damaged throat, to the top of her head.

"Authenticity," she gasps, piercing her bottom lip with her teeth when Castle's knee slides between hers, his hands on her hips, dragging her down to grind against the hard muscle of his thigh. "What'd he say?"

"Wanted to know what was going on, where I was, if I was with you," he lists, his mouth open at her clavicle, his nose nudging the neck of the t-shirt she had changed into at her apartment out of the way.

Kate palms the back of his head, combs her fingers through his hair and tries to force a steady breath down the abraded airway of her throat, feed the quickening rise and fall of her chest. "He definitely knows now."

Castle chuckles, the sound so dark and rich when he's like this, breathless and coming undone against her, but still somehow in control, always turning the tables on her.

"Yeah, pretty sure he got the message," he mumbles, his words vibrating through her chest, the cage of her ribs shuddering, urging her body up to meet the work of his mouth going lower, lower, lower-

"Mm, think you can handle a round three, Castle?"

His hands are feathering at the naked skin of her sides beneath her shirt and they brace her body when he spins her around without warning, her back slamming into the door as the hard press of his body pins her there.

"Technically," he breathes, his lips dusting her mouth, eliciting fissures of electricity that crackle and _burn_ through every inch of her, and her mouth parts without her permission, her body arcing into the unforgiving wall of his, desperate for more, needing him again, again, again- "It'd be round four."


	14. Chapter 14

"Just act normal," Castle reminds her as she pulls into her parking spot at the Twelfth the following morning, turning the ignition off and shooting him a look in the dimness of the garage.

The rest of yesterday's afternoon at his loft had been blessedly uneventful, his body craving sleep - craving her - the majority of the evening, the night. He had slept hard on his couch after their round four against his front door, awakened to the smell of the Chinese food she had ordered – they'd have to talk about who she gave out his addresses to later – not long after. But recovering his energy had been too much of a struggle, his mind nor his body up for much else that evening, and he hadn't put up a fight when Kate had led him to his bed, draped her body at his back after she'd used the bathroom and his toothbrush.

With his stomach full and the warmth of her like a blanket covering his skin, he had drifted back to sleep with ease for the first time in years, giving into the need for the rest necessary to his shoulder, her throat. The last thought to cross his mind was the fleeting wish that it could always be like this, even after he was done pretending she needed him for a temporary bodyguard.

Kate Beckett didn't _need_ anyone else's protection; he was just lucky she was allowing him to have her back, to keep her safe in the few ways he knew how.

"Me? You're the one I'm worried about," she mutters, turning off the ignition and pocketing the keys.

"Hey, who's the spy here?" he huffs, but grinning nonetheless at the halfhearted roll of her eyes. It's been just over 36 hours since Kate had learned the truth, since she had chosen to embrace rather than begrudge it, and it's the most freeing sensation he's ever known, to hold no life altering secrets from another person.

"The dopey smiles and lingering gazes aren't exactly helping your side of this argument," she points out, reaching across the console to pat his cheek.

"But they're still pretty endearing, right?" he quips, catching her wrist before her hand can fall away, but releasing the bone when her opposite set of fingers close around the door handle. "Hey, wait."

Kate arches an eyebrow in question, but he merely shifts towards her, curves his palm at her nape and drags her mouth to his for a bruising kiss that has her panting, nipping at his upper lip for more and groaning as he gentles her.

"That's not helping either," she husks, trying to glare at him from beneath the fringe of her lashes, but the ink black pools of her pupils makes the task rather difficult.

"Just keep looking at me like that all day and we'll pull this off without a hitch," Castle chuckles, smearing one more hard and unforgiving kiss to her mouth before he's pushing open his own door, slipping out of the black charger and waiting the extra ten seconds for Beckett to do the same.

She shoots him a scowl, locks the car with a click of her thumb to her keys and starts towards the entrance, but glances back over her shoulder when he fails to follow. "You coming?"

"Going to wait a few minutes, don't want it to be too obvious," he explains, walking backwards while she watches with a quirk of her lips. "Actually, I should probably go buy you a coffee."

"Even better plan," she smirks, the soft curls of her hair bouncing along her blazer clad shoulders as she strides forward without another look towards him spared, her heels clicking harshly on the concrete.

Rick takes his time retrieving her coffee from down the block, entering the Twelfth at a leisurely pace, accepting kind words and 'get well' wishes from fellow officers and detectives who have learned of his brawl with 3XK, the gunshot wound he suffered. It has an uncomfortable line of tension streaking down his spine.

He isn't used to this form of camaraderie that spans throughout the entire precinct, the mutual respect they all held for one another, something they had extended to him.

"You okay?" Kate asks when he places her coffee on her desk nearly twenty minutes since they had parted ways in the parking lot, her head tilted in gentle concern, but Castle shakes his in response.

"It's just weird here, how everyone is," he states, flustered, but she doesn't give him a funny look, doesn't rush him, simply waits for him to continue, to untangle the confused web of his thoughts. "In the - at my old workplace," he corrects, just in case. Can never be too careful, especially when Vikram was only a matter of feet away. "Everyone minded their own business, didn't really care to get involved in anyone else's lives, but here… I've had at least five officers come up and commend me since I got here."

A strange tenderness crosses her face, but she smothers it, doesn't allow it to linger for his sake.

"That's what it means to be a team, Rick. A family," she murmurs, cradling the to go cup between her palms. "I may not be as close to the majority of the officers as I am to Ryan and Esposito, but I know each person who works here to some degree, and I'd have their backs if they needed me, just like they'd have mine."

Castle nods. "I can see that."

"They'd have yours too, you know," she adds, something like trepidation clinging to the corners of her mouth, her smile tentative and… oh, that's her shy smile, isn't it?

Because her words had been a sort of offer, a possibility, a new path to follow. A terrifying idea. One he may actually consider once all of this is over and his mission is complete.

"Maybe," he murmurs, drifting back towards the cracked door of her office. "For now, I've got you, Beckett."

"True, and that's more than enough," she muses, a playful grin on her lips as she brings her coffee cup to her mouth, and he grins back at her like an idiot, unable to stop himself from relishing in how easy it is with her. To play, to joke, to love-

And that was his cue to go.

"I'll see you later, Captain," he says, nudging the door open with his good shoulder, still able to catch her mumbled assent before he enters the bullpen, striding across the floor to the workroom he and Vikram share.

But when Castle steps inside, there's another man sitting at his station, one he's never seen before, chatting with Vikram. Both men fall silent the moment Castle appears, sounding alarm bells through Rick's system. He doesn't recognize the man who stands from his seat, but there's something familiar, a red flag that arises at the sight of him.

"Hey Castle, there's someone I need you to meet. Shut the door," Vikram states with a smile, but his voice is low, his eyes dark, and Rick doesn't like this at all.

But he follows Vikram's polite demand, clicks the door closed behind him, and arches an eyebrow at his colleague.

"Agent Castle, this is Caleb Brown, local defense attorney and second in command to LokSat," Vikram announces quietly and Caleb Brown holds out his hand, a smile that sets Castle on edge spreading across his lips despite the solemn expression claiming his face.

"Nice to meet you, Agent," Caleb adds and Rick grudgingly lifts his good hand, accepts the firm shake of Caleb's. "I didn't expect my assistance to be required. Both my boss and Vikram have spoken quite highly of you."

"Assistance?" Castle repeats, brow furrowing. "What are you talking about?"

"You have one job, Castle," Vikram begins, walking slowly from the other side of the room to approach him, a grim set to his features that Rick's never seen before. "You distract Captain Beckett. You keep her occupied, keep her nose out of her investigation into LokSat. We've gone over this."

"Yes, and I think it's quite clear that I've had little problems in doing so," Castle answers, lies, but tenses when Vikram lays a hand along Rick's injured shoulder, barely applying pressure over the stitched flesh, but oh so ready to.

"Where in that job description does it say for you to _save_ her, Rick?" Vikram questions, sharing a quick look with Caleb, who silently watches from a few feet away, observing with his arms crossed over his chest. "If Jerry Tyson would have killed her, that would have been out of our control, no blood on our hands, or yours."

"I was already headed to her place," Rick replies, shrugging out of Vikram's hold. "The fact that I arrived when a psychopath was trying to strangle her was pure coincidence. Surely you didn't expect me to just stand there, let her die."

"Coincidence?" Caleb echoes, tilting his head with intrigue. "You know, Mr. Castle, with your job and the stakes it carries, I thought you would be intelligent enough to realize when you're being watched as well." Rick's blood runs cold, freezes in his veins and spreads ice like lead through his bones. "You were already keeping an eye on Captain Beckett before Tyson even arrived. You didn't go to her place out of coincidence, you went to rescue her."

Castle doesn't waste another second in attempting to lie. "What difference does it make? If she's dead or alive, as long as she stays away from LokSat, isn't that all that matters?"

Something flashes through Caleb's dark eyes, subtle but just noticeable enough for Rick to catch, and that icy dread in his system grows thicker, heavier, ready to crack under the pressure.

"Yes," Caleb agrees, but something's wrong, the alarm bells screaming through his head now deafening. He needs to get Kate out of here, as far away as possible. "That really is all that matters, Agent."

Vikram's brow furrows, and well, at least he didn't have to worry about the other man being in on whatever it was that Caleb Brown was planning.

"Now that we've finally had the chance to meet, I'll be in touch more often, do my part in ensuring Captain Beckett stays in her lane," Caleb states, too calm, too collected, but Rick nods back with the same amount of composure. "In the meantime, I do have a meeting with the boss, so I'll see you both some other time."

"Looking forward to it," Castle mutters, watching Brown's mouth coil into a smirk.

"I like you, Mr. Castle," Caleb remarks, striding for the door with his head held high. "Don't give me any reason to change my mind."

"I'll do my best."

Caleb winks before exiting the room, his briefcase swinging at his side as he heads for the elevator, cutting his gaze to Kate sitting in her office, sipping coffee and reading over paperwork at her desk, and Rick curls his fingers into a fist at his side.

"Yeah, I wouldn't piss him off," Vikram quips under his breath, already returning to his desk, fingers resuming their rhythm across his laptop's keyboard as if he had never been interrupted by the impromptu meeting that had just taken place.

Castle glances back to Beckett's office just as the elevator doors close on Caleb Brown. She's already looking back at him, a question in her gaze, and she must be able to read the growing unease in his eyes, because she rises from her desk, exits her office and heads through the bullpen without drawing attention, towards the farthest stairwell.

"Do we have a case yet?" Castle asks Vikram, but the other man shakes his head.

"Nah, still trying to clean everything up after the whole Tyson mess," Vikram answers, shooting Castle a reproachful look that earns a scowl in response. He really hopes he gets the chance to beat the guy senseless before this ordeal is over with. "Did you at least make progress with Beckett after saving her life? I noticed she ignored the text I sent her the next morning, and well, that phone call yesterday…"

Castle ignores the implication gleaming in Vikram's gaze, the sick knowledge, and merely shakes his head. "She's not even thinking about LokSat."

"At least you're doing _something_ right," Vikram chuckles, and Castle excuses himself before he really does punish Vikram with his fists, taking the opposite set of stairs across the homicide floor that will lead him to her.

Kate is waiting for him in the gym when he descends the stairs, slips into the women's locker room with her, into a shower stall where he's certain there's no way they can be tracked, listened to.

"What did Caleb Brown want with you?" she whispers, leaning back against the cool tile wall, gnawing on her bottom lip.

"How do you know him?" Rick questions, mimicking her and pressing his back to the wall to refrain from pacing in the compact space.

"He's worked as a defense attorney for a few cases here and there," Kate explains, searching his face with concern, the same dread he feels shining bright in her eyes. "He's a part of this?"

"Oh, more than _a part_ ," he mutters, scrubbing at his eyes. "He's second in command to LokSat, apparently. And he's not happy with me."

"What? Why?" Beckett demands, instinctively shifting forward, her crossed arms grazing his chest.

"They know I'm compromised, Kate. I don't think he's figured out that I've clued you in, but he knows it's personal, that I'm not doing my job." Castle grits his teeth. "They're going to kill you, probably kill us both-"

"How could they know?" she hisses, her hands reaching for his hips in a developing habit, tugging him closer. "We haven't done anything to-"

"I stopped Tyson from killing you," he breathes, squeezing his eyes shut. "It was all the confirmation they needed."

Kate's fingers tighten at his sides. "So they're coming for us?"

"For you, most likely," he corrects, opening his eyes to see the embers of fear in her eyes, the flames of ferocity, so ready to fight. "They could kill me if it's convenient, especially since I know about LokSat, but they'll kill you first, punish me."

"Rick-"

"Let me take you someplace," he interrupts, pleads, already knowing it's a lost cause, but unable to help it, to give her the chance to save her own life, just this once. "Someplace safe, away from here."

She drifts forward to bury her face against his neck, her head tucked beneath his chin, and he bands his good arm around her, prepares for the blow.

"You know I can't run," she whispers, sounding so apologetic, but yeah, he already knew. It's not who she is to run away, to surrender or hide; it's not who he fell in love with. She would stand and fight this thing to the death, and he'll be by her side through it all.

"I know," he murmurs, smearing his lips to her temple. "Wouldn't be you."

"You can still back out of this, Castle. It's not your fight-"

"The hell it isn't," he growls, reaching between them to cup his fingers to her jaw, lift her chin to meet his eyes. "I - I care about you, Kate. And I'm not going anywhere. I'm with you until the end."

Her eyes flutter shut on the agony that spills through her gaze, the anguish, but they flare open again a moment later, a shimmer of gold in her irises that causes his breath to catch.

"Partners then," she confirms, covering the hand at her face and turning to kiss his palm.

Castle nods and tilts his head forward to dust his lips along her hairline. He's never had a partner before.

"Partners," he confirms.

* * *

Rick is asleep on the sofa across from her desk, his arms folded atop his abdomen and his head propped on her gun styled throw pillow, a frown etched deep into his lips. He was afraid to leave her alone, leave her vulnerable, and she couldn't say she felt safe without him near, without her eyes on him as well now that she knew the vultures were circling them both.

Something was going to happen, a life or death scenario where LokSat is concerned, she can feel it in her guts, but despite the instinctual warning signs, there was no way to prepare for it. They were no closer to taking LokSat down, discovering the true identity behind the name than they had been two days ago when she and Rick had initially combined their efforts. But those involved in the organization were one step closer to taking her down by the sounds of it.

Taking him down with her.

"I can feel you panicking from all the way over here," Castle mumbles, his eyes still closed, but his brow quirking, and Kate sighs, buries her face in her hands.

"Not panicking," she mutters, pressing the heels of her palms to her eye sockets. "Just frustrated."

Castle sighs and she peeks between the slots of his fingers to see his eyes sliding open, trained on the ceiling overhead. "I'm sorry, Kate. You just survived a serial killer's attack on your life and now you're dealing with this."

"Not your fault," she points out, watching his head roll towards her, an incredulous expression roaring through his features, and Beckett holds up her hand before he can even start drowning himself in the blame.

"You deserve a break," he murmurs anyway, his mouth forming a pout, petulant like a child, and Kate's lips quirk.

"Yeah, well so do you, babe."

Castle's eyebrows hitch to his hairline as the delight spills through his face, and at least it washes away the guilt.

"Babe, huh?" he muses, swinging his legs over the edge of the couch, and she huffs, curses her mouth for letting the stupid term slip out. She _never_ used pet names, they were so far from her style, but so was practically everything else about her relationship with Rick.

"Stop," she huffs, glancing back down to her paperwork, but she hasn't been able to concentrate for the last hour, the last _few_ hours, if she was being honest. Ever since she had noticed Caleb Brown and Castle exchanging death glares that morning and the truth about the defense attorney had been revealed to her.

Was _anyone_ in this precinct - in her life - who they said they were?

"We should go back to my place, honey," he quips, strolling across the room to prop his hip against her desk, and Kate lifts her gaze to glare at him.

"I will not hesitate to maim you."

"Baby?"

"Castle."

"Sweetheart?"

"I will sleep in the guest bedroom if you don't-"

"Shutting up now," he announces, reaching for her hand as she smothers her grin, swats at the coil of his fingers at her bicep. "C'mon Beckett, we'll stop by a grocery store on the way there, I'll cook you an actual dinner."

"It's already ten o'clock," she points out, sighing in defeat and standing from her desk chair at his gentle tug. The time the only reason she's choosing to go with him, not at all because the appeal of Richard Castle cooking her dinner is more important than her working late.

"You've hardly eaten today. Late dinner is better than no dinner," he shrugs, and Kate rolls her eyes, brushing past him to snag her messenger bag from the floor, propped up against the couch.

"Stop keeping track of my eating habits," she mutters, slinging the bag over her shoulder, and accepting the blazer he holds out to her.

Castle scoffs at her. "If I didn't bring you food, you wouldn't eat."

"I get busy," she defends, nudging the door open for him, flicking off the lights to her office, and locking up once they're both out. "I can take care of myself just fine."

"Never said you couldn't," he appeases with a supplicating hand raised between them as they begin the brief walk towards the elevators. The bullpen is never empty, but it's scarce of her usual team – both Ryan and Esposito taking a week of paid leave, a short vacation she believed would do them a world of good, especially Kevin. And the text of gratitude she'd received from Jenny earlier that morning only solidified her decision as the right one. "But I like taking care of you too."

"You know, I used to think you were all playboy charm," she muses, ignoring the fluttering in her chest his words so easily elicit. Most lines like that, sugary sweet words from men meant to make her swoon, often had her gagging, but Castle… he was just so earnest, his words so sincere, his eyes like dark skies with the stars of affection shining through. For a trained liar, he was terrible at hiding his emotions from her. That is, if he was even trying anymore. "But now I see it's all sap."

The corners of his mouth twitch while she stabs the call button with her index finger, and he steps into the elevator with her in synchrony, leaning against the back wall with his smile illuminating his face, glimmering in his eyes.

"Only for you, Captain Beckett."


	15. Chapter 15

Days pass without incident, over a week of normality that has him on edge. Kate does a fine job of distracting him, keeps his mind from wandering, usually with her mouth, and he works to do the same for her, to ease the existing paranoia she knows he can so easily read in her body language from morning to night.

"It must mean we're pulling this off," Castle had assured her late one night, stroking his fingers up and down her naked spine in the darkness of his room, the moonlight bleeding through his blinds bathing him in the ethereal glow. "If they suspected anything, they would have tried something by now."

"I know," Beckett had murmured, her arms curled beneath her chest, her cheek pressed to his bicep, a form of intimacy that was so foreign to her, but came so natural with him. It scared her if she thought about it too much, what it could mean. "Part of me wishes they would just try something already, make the first move."

"It's like a chess game," he'd mused, his fingers caressing the nape of her neck, gliding up to comb through her hair. "Slow and meticulous."

He was certainly right about that. They were in a grudge match with LokSat, just two pawns up against an army of imposing kings and bishops, and she had her doubts that they would be the ones achieving a 'checkmate' anytime soon.

It's driving her crazy, the waiting, the watching over her shoulder worse than ever before, and she knows Castle isn't fairing much better. Neither was his paranoia, especially if his reaction to her leaving the loft this morning without informing him is any indication.

She had woken needing the release that only the pound of her sneakers on hard pavement and the spill of sweat down her spine could provide, the racing beat of her heart as it tried to keep up with the speed of her legs carrying her down the streets while she ran through the city. In retrospect, yes, she could have at least left him a note, let him know she had gone for a run so he wouldn't automatically assume she had been kidnapped, but she had stirred awake at four, just a few short hours ago, from a restless sleep with her body thrumming with energy.

Beckett had simply slipped from his bed and grabbed her running shoes without even thinking.

She regrets it now, as she collides with him on the sidewalk outside his building in the midst of daybreak, already on her way back after a good seven miles, because oh… he's a mess.

"Kate," he breathes, his wide eyes flooding with relief, and he almost lurches for her, but immediately refrains, restraining himself with a form of self-control that had been engrained into his mind, his body. Vulnerability was a death sentence in his line of work, but he had built a door through most of those impenetrable walls for her, let her waltz through them whenever she pleased.

Sometimes she worries she's causing those walls constructed to protect him to crumble because of her, but she can't manage to stop it, to _want_ to stop. She doesn't think he's ever let anyone in before and she doesn't think she's ever had a heart like his in her possession. Something so tender and beautiful, breakable.

"Where the hell did you go?" he hisses, his relief fading fast, but he quickly answers his own question, sweeping his gaze down the glistening skin of her face, her neck, to the single selection of sweat stained athletic wear she had brought over from her apartment last week. "Oh."

Kate attempts to catch her breath, her chest still heaving and her lungs burning with exertion, but she huffs at him for the response.

"I'm allowed to leave, Rick," she gets out, pushing past him for the lobby's entrance. She needs water, and for the conversation she assumes they're about to have, they both need privacy from the busy streets of SoHo.

Castle follows after her, jogging up the stairs at her back, but snagging her by the elbow once they're at the top floor of his building. She's breathing heavy again after the climb, but Rick's chest rises and falls without change as they reach the landing and it bothers her, makes her feel more weak and inadequate than she already does.

"I never said you weren't, but there are people who want you dead. The least you can do is-"

"You think I don't know that?" she snaps, ripping her arm from his grasp, all of that freshly drained frustration and fear rushing back in to fill her system. "But I am not going to sit around in your apartment all day, asking your permission before I leave like a child who needs constant supervision."

"Permission? Kate, this has nothing to do with permission, I'm not trying to _control_ you," Castle returns with his jaw tight, patience barely under control, and she knows better than to lash out at him. But maybe she still harbors some anger at him for the lies she's already begun to forgive, part of her still hating him for the reason why he came into her life in the first place, and she channels that anger without thinking. Back to picking at scabs before they can scar over. "I'm just trying to keep you alive-"

"I never asked you to! I never asked for any of this. I survived a lot worse than LokSat before I met you, Castle, and I am more than capable of protecting myself," she bites out, and oh, she regrets that too, the moment she says it. Regrets the shockwave of hurt that ripples across his face, has him taking a step back from her, drawing up that expressionless mask to settle along his features that causes her stomach to twist.

The anger that had risen like a flame in her chest is all snuffed out, nothing left but embers that crackle and pop along her ribcage like firecrackers of remorse.

"You're right, Kate," he murmurs, deadly calm, completely withdrawing from her. "You didn't ask me to do any of this. I took that choice from you when I barged into your life on a mission, and you may not want me around-"

"Rick, I didn't-"

"But you can make that decision after LokSat's no longer in the picture. And I can promise you, after that, I won't interfere."

He turns away from her and she's frozen in his hallway, watching him start back towards the stairs with her heart in her throat.

"Where are you going?" she calls out, the words scraping up her throat despite how it's healed over the past week.

Castle doesn't turn to answer her, allows her nothing more than a glimpse of his profile before he reaches the stairwell. "I need to take a walk. We both need a little space."

She stands in the middle of the hall long after the echo of his footsteps have disappeared, long after the sounds of his departure have been swallowed by silence, and Kate mechanically shuffles to his door, recovers the key from the hidden slot along the wall that he showed her last Thursday. He was right, they both could use some space, but not like this.

She should have known that spending this much time together, practically living with him after hardly a couple of months of knowing him, a mere week of being more than friends, colleagues, would drive her to a breaking point. She was a natural born loner at times, craving her solitude, never too good at sharing space. Though… Castle had learned that quite early on, respected it.

Kate turns the key and enters the loft, feeling as empty as it looks without him here to fill the quiet, the blank walls and naked interior.

He often left her alone in the evenings after work, now that she's thinking about it. He would typically disappear into the kitchen to conjure up a meal for dinner while she took advantage of his massive en suite, the sinfully wonderful Jacuzzi tub, or retreat into the office where he kept his laptop while she lounged on the couch with a case file from the precinct or one of the many books from his shelves.

They may have moved faster than she would have planned, but aside from sleeping with him, sharing an apartment until hers no longer felt like a tomb and a hunting ground combined, not much else had changed. He wasn't smothering her, like she had feared, wasn't pressuring her or trying to control her; he was trying to make the best of a bad situation, to make their relationship feel as normal as possible, despite constantly being in the crosshairs, despite the fact that he had entered her life on a lie he spent every day trying to make up for.

And she'd taken all of his efforts and crushed them on the floor of his hallway.

Kate groans and presses her knuckles to her eye sockets, digging the bones into her eyelids until she sees stars that have her swaying. She drops her hands and sighs, heads for the kitchen for some water before she ends up passing out in his foyer.

She wants to go after him, run through every street to find him if she has to, but he may not want that, not yet. She would need time if she had been on the receiving end of her words' blow, and she owes him the same courtesy.

So she sips at her water, has two slices of toast for breakfast, and waits. She doesn't have to be at the precinct today, not until noon; she has the time to wait him out, to shower and change into a blouse and clean pair of slacks, to stare mindlessly at the television set up in his office, but after three hours, time's running out and so is her will to stay put.

Beckett paces through the loft, the hems of her pant legs dragging along her bare heels without her shoes, until she enters the bedroom and her gaze falls to her phone on the nightstand. His is gone from its usual resting spot on his side of the bed, his charger disconnected from the wall, which means he must have the device on him, would never leave without it.

Kate eases down onto the edge of the bed, snagging her phone from the tabletop and opening her messaging app, seeking out his name.

* * *

 _Come home, Castle._

He stares down at the text message illuminating his screen for a long moment, the word _home_ stopping him short on his aimless walk through Greenwich Village. But she only means that it's his actual home, where she's still waiting for him to return apparently, nothing more.

Rick steps off to the side, out of the way of fellow pedestrians, and leans against the brick wall of a café, breathes through the constant ache lancing through his opposite shoulder. He hurts, every pound of his heart rattling the bones near his injury, the still healing gunshot wound that thrives with dull agony, but he had been too stubborn to turn around and retrieve his medicine from the apartment when the pain had made itself known on his way down the stairs.

At least it was a nice distraction from the thoughts swarming his brain.

 _You have to be at work in a couple of hours, I'll see you afterwards._

That should be enough time, right? Enough time for her to spend apart from him for today at least, to keep her from losing her mind due to his constant presence. He had asked too much of her within this past week, exposed too much of himself, all of the dark, desperate parts of him that she had so effortlessly shown light upon. A beacon, his mind supplies, but he should have known it was only a matter of time before he began to suffocate her, smothered the light with his neediness.

His phone vibrates, buzzing against the skin of his palm quicker than he would have expected, and Rick glances down, frowns at her response in confusion.

 _Don't make me come find you._

He doesn't understand this woman, wants to text back with the fact that he was just trying to abide by her wishes, but he relents with a sigh, turns back in the direction of his loft. It probably isn't a good idea to leave her alone for long anyway, not if LokSat is watching and could see her vulnerable, open to a sniper's bullet through his window or a hired killer to sneak in and subdue her.

Castle starts back down the sidewalk, picking up his pace a little. He'll come when she calls, he can admit that, but only for the sake of her protection.

Once he knew she was safe, once LokSat is taken down, Kate can make whatever decisions she wants – love him or leave him – but for now, he would have to remain in her company to some capacity. And hopefully, she could live with that.

* * *

It's past ten when she hears a key in the front door, twenty minutes since she had sent her last text, and Kate holds her breath as she stands from the couch in his office, braces herself for a confrontation of some sort. But when she steps out into the living room, finds Castle in the foyer, he offers her nothing more than a nod of his head in greeting.

"Hey," she tries to start. She's not good at this, _talking_ , but she's willing to give it a shot. Anything to wipe that wounded look from his eyes.

"Hey," he murmurs, his body stiff with tension, his gaze averted from her, but he's striding towards her and… brushing right past her for the bedroom.

"Castle?" she calls, watching him head straight into the adjoining bathroom, following after a second to see him unscrewing the cap from a bottle of pain relievers. "Oh, your shoulder," she breathes, entering the bathroom, catching his eyes in the mirror.

He downs two of the pills with a rough swallow. "It's fine."

Kate ignores him, stepping up alongside him to peel the sleeve of his shirt upwards, expose the mottled skin where the bullet had seared him. He had come looking for her in nothing more than a t-shirt and jeans, left in the same attire, and her guilt blooms brighter in her stomach at the cool touch of his flesh beneath her fingertips. It wasn't freezing outside, but it certainly wasn't warm.

"I'm sorry, Rick," she murmurs, dusting her fingers over the slash of a forming scar, seeking out his gaze in the mirror once more, finding desolate eyes and a furrowed brow staring back at her.

"For what?"

"For what I said," she sighs, easing the sleeve of his shirt back down, but not removing her hand, sealing her palm to his bicep to transfer some of her warmth to his skin. "I didn't mean to put this all on you."

"What are you talking about? If anyone's to blame here for anything, it's me, Beckett. I-"

"No," she cuts in, releasing his arm to ease into the space in front of him, between the sink and his hips, facing him rather than the man in the mirror. "Castle, you can't just - you're not the one at fault here. This mess with LokSat has us both under a lot of stress, but that's no excuse for me to blow up at you."

Rick narrows his gaze on her, as if trying to read her, understand her, and does he really think he's to blame for all of those unfair things she had said in the hallway?

"If I didn't think they would try to bomb your apartment or poison the food in your fridge, or even shoot a bullet through your window, I wouldn't advocate so strongly that you stay with me," Castle states, and yeah, apparently, he does. "I know you need your space and I never said you couldn't take care of yourself. Because I've seen what you can do."

"Castle-"

"And it's not that I can guarantee your safety," he continues, scraping a hand through his hair, worsening the already severe disarray of the strands. "I just make it a little harder for them to get to you, but like I told you, Kate, once this is all over with, you'll have your life back and I don't have to be a part of it-"

"Will you shush?" she growls, lifting her palm to his mouth just to shut him up, repressing a smile when his eyebrows hitch rather comically. "I don't want a bodyguard, I want a partner. That's what you promised me. Partners, equals, having each other's backs - _that_ is what I want with you. Even after this is all over."

Kate lowers her hand at the part of his lips against her palm.

"I'm sorry for what I said in the hall, Castle," she sighs, cupping his cheek in her hand, smoothing her thumb to the stain of purple stamped beneath his eye. "If I hurt you in any way."

Rick leans into her touch, raises one of the hands that had remained motionless at his side to touch her waist. "I'm sorry for overreacting this morning. Just - when I woke up and you were gone… my mind went to the worst case scenario before anything else."

"I don't blame you," she murmurs, canting into the claim of his palm at her hip. "Kinda hard not to automatically panic considering our circumstances. I'll leave a note next time, or just take you with me."

"Cute," he muses, a touch of teasing bleeding into his tone that sets her at ease. "How you think you could keep up with me on a run."

A laugh escapes her lips, relieved and amused. If he watched her at all before he met her, studied her routines, he's seen how fast she is, how strong her endurance can be; he wouldn't stand a chance.

"Just tell me when you're ready for me to crush you in a race, Rick Castle," she hums, lowering her hands from his face to hook at his sides.

"Once I'm healed up, you're on," he grins, rolling his injured shoulder and exhaling through the twinge of pain that flickers across his face. "In the meantime, have you had anything to eat?"

"Toast," she answers and Castle huffs in disapproval.

"Want to go out for a late breakfast before work?" Castle dislodges her hands from his sides, squeezing her fingers before he's stepping past her into the bedroom, heading for the closet.

"Sure, I'd love to." Kate follows after him, drifting towards his bed and watching him change quickly from his jeans and t-shirt to the work appropriate attire of slacks and a button up. "Did you already have a place in mind?"

"Yeah, there's actually this place I passed while I was walking earlier and it looks great, has good reviews online," he informs her, easing down onto the edge of the bed, his shoulder grazing her thigh as he bends to slip his socked feet into a pair of shoes.

"Sounds, good, but Castle?" He glances up, shoes on his feet, all dressed and ready to go, and Kate places her knee to the mattress space beside his hip, combs back the flop of his hair from his forehead. "I meant what I said about being able to protect myself," she murmurs, trapping his lips beneath the seal of her fingertips after she says it, before he can speak his protest or understanding, requiring his silence before she can continue. "But you make me feel safe, Rick. And it's - no one's ever done that for me before."

Castle's lips spill into a gentle smile beneath her fingertips and she draws them away, allows the curve of his mouth to blossom before he coaxes her down with a hand to her chin, touches the exposed piece of his joy to her lips.

"It's mutual, Beckett," he murmurs and she nudges her nose to his cheek, closes her eyes and listens to the exhale of his breath, feels it skittering warm across her throat. "You make me feel safe, happy… and more, like I'm more."

Her eyes peel open to find his shining in gratitude she is so not deserving of.

"You are more, Castle. You always have been, just needed someone to make you see it," she tells him with a quirk of her lips that she touches to the scar above his eyebrow.

Whether he believes it or not, Richard Castle is a good man, far better than he's been led to believe, and if she can help him see that, then maybe she isn't so bad for him after all.


	16. Chapter 16

Rick really wishes they didn't have to work today.

He's gone on plenty of dates with Kate within the near two months of knowing her, but breakfast at the charming café in the village had felt different. She had sat across from him at the tiny table, the toe of her pump grazing along his shin every few minutes, her hand absentmindedly toying with his atop the table while they had waited for their food, and the smile on her lips had hardly faltered. Not to say their past dates hadn't been fun, meaningful in one way or another, but this one… with no secrets or half truths between them, no hesitation or denial, this late breakfast with her had been the best kind of different.

"What happens after we end this?" he had asked, his tone nonchalant, conversational, but Kate had tilted her head at him in confusion. He knew he risked scaring her off if he came off as too needy, if he showed all his cards, more than he already had, but he didn't want to play it close to the vest anymore. He wanted them all out on the table. Or at least laid out one at a time. "With us, I mean."

"Ah," she'd hummed, lifting her mug of coffee to her lips. "You think once I have my answers, I won't need you anymore."

"I didn't-"

"I know," she had chuckled before taking a slow sip of the steaming liquid. "I know you didn't, but I don't blame you for worrying about that."

"I'm not worried," Castle had argued quietly. "I just - I haven't exactly given you many reasons to want to stick around."

Beckett had arched an eyebrow in response. "Great sex is a fantastic reason, Castle."

His mouth had popped open like the soft burst of laughter that bubbled from her lips and he can't help grinning at the memory of the sound, the bright melody of her amusement a pleasant light in the darkness, still vivid in his mind.

"Kidding, Rick," she'd assured him, her lips still curled in the corners, but the lines bracketing her mouth were deep, the branches of exhaustion expanding from the edges of her eyes more prominent after the morning they'd had, the past week and a half. "You've given me plenty of reasons. If you hadn't, I wouldn't be here right now. Would never have stayed that first night, every night after. So after we put this to bed, we… we explore the possibilities."

She'd snagged her bottom lip between her teeth, nervous, but willing to give him a chance, the idea of them a chance, and that's all he needs.

"Now, stop staring at me and eat your omelet, Agent Castle," she had murmured to him, reaching across with her fork to snag a piece of his turkey sausage, grinning at him while she chewed.

They'd had their first fight – of sorts – along with one of their first real conversations about what a potential future could hold, and now, he really just wants to go back home, indulge in a little more making up.

But after breakfast, they had split the bill at Kate's insistence, and walked out of the restaurant hand in hand, driven her cruiser to the Twelfth. It was rare for her to have a half-day, but he knew the department was attempting to coax her into taking it easy after her near death experience. They had wanted her to accept two weeks' leave; she had scoffed and settled for a few days and a handful of late morning starts, like today.

"Hey Castle," she had called before they parted ways in the parking garage, like always, putting forth less effort than necessary to conceal the fact that they arrive at the precinct together most days. Her team of detectives, her boys, still had no idea – though, Rick was sure they had their suspicions – about any relationship developments between the two of them, but if LokSat was actually watching, then their displays of subtle hints would be enough to fool the leader and his lackeys.

At least, Castle hoped so.

"Yeah?" he'd quipped, turning back from his path towards the exit, pausing in his plans for a coffee run.

Kate had strode up to him in the dimness, the floor temporarily empty, and hooked her fingers in his belt loops.

"I know it's been a rough couple of weeks," she'd murmured, chewing on her bottom lip, and he'd tapped his thumb to the corner of her mouth to encourage her teeth to release the abused flesh, lessen his urge to tend to it. "But I was thinking that maybe tonight, we could just pretend things are normal for a few hours?"

That had surprised him.

"Normal?" he'd echoed, watching her lips quirk beneath the touch of his thumb.

"Yeah, just… we could have that movie date, make popcorn, order in." She'd shrugged, shifting in front of him as if she was unsure of herself, shy. That _definitely_ surprised him.

He had never seen Kate Beckett bashful before.

"Okay," he'd grinned. Putting LokSat on the backburner for a single night didn't necessarily sit well with him, but they were in the middle of a waiting game with no way to be proactive about the situation. So what could curling up on the couch with her and some popcorn, watching a movie, and pretending they were just two normal people in a normal relationship hurt? "Sounds like fun."

Her eyes had glimmered in the darkness of the garage, the gleam of her teeth peeking out from between her lips visible. "Great. You up for a John Woo marathon? Maybe we could squeeze in Forbidden Planet too, just to lighten the mood?"

Castle had cocked his head in confusion at the foreign names and titles. "John who?"

"You haven't seen… oh my gosh, Castle," she had breathed, her lips parting in dismayed surprise. "No John Woo _or_ Forbidden Planet?"

He had shaken his head.

"We'll definitely watch both then," she had nodded, more to herself than him, and then she had arched on her toes to smudge a quick kiss to his mouth. "Go get me some coffee, Agent. I'll plan our film lineup for tonight before I have to dig into what I'm sure are mounting piles of paperwork on my desk."

Kate had turned on her four-inch heels to stride away from him, sparing a moment to grin back at him over her shoulder when he failed to move for a second too long, staring after her with a stupid smile on his lips.

He liked the idea of normal when it was with her. He wants normal to be their reality, or at least, a form of normal that didn't involve LokSat. She needed LokSat out of her life, and soon.

"Don't want to live like this for much longer," Kate had sighed only a few nights ago, half asleep and draped at his side, and his heart had stumbled, skipped in the most painful way before she continued. "Looking over our shoulders 24/7."

Over a week, she had been living with him, breaking all the rules he had ever learned when it comes to the speed of relationships, never actually experiencing one himself. Not like this.

Rick had had flings over the years, faked romances that lasted weeks in order to gain information, but that wasn't him. It was always a role, a character he made up in his head to get the job done. With Kate… it's the first time he's been with a woman for the sole reason of _wanting to._

"It won't be much longer," he had promised her, his lips brushing her hairline as her lashes had fluttered shut.

He wouldn't allow this to go on any longer. It was time to end LokSat and peel the target off of Kate's back for good. And find their new normal.

Which he had been feeling pretty confident about accomplishing until Caleb Brown showed up inside the Twelfth again later that evening, only ten days after his last visit, heading straight for Beckett's office this time.

"Uh oh," Vikram had chuckled from his station, watching Caleb enter Beckett's office after a single knock with amusement lining his lips.

Castle had glanced to the rat of a man across the room, arched his eyebrow in question to hide his anxiety. "What's going on?"

"Nothing really, I just ran a trace on one of Caleb's fake aliases to trick Beckett into thinking we had another lead. He's just confronting her about it now, giving her a warning."

"But she never asked you to-"

"No, but you're not the only one playing a role here, Agent," Vikram had reminded him. "Huh, looks like Beckett may be trying to make a deal."

Castle follows Vikram's line of sight, notices Kate standing from her desk, her hands gesturing between herself and Caleb, that passionate gleam of reason bleeding from her eyes, and oh no… no, she wouldn't.

Shit, she would.

He really wishes they hadn't had to work today.

* * *

"I just don't get it," Kate admits, shaking her head at the man before her. "You served a full term in the Peace Corps, you worked for the EPA, you brought legal action against corrupt corporations-"

"What's your point, Kate?" Caleb mutters, crossing his arms and staring her down, but she swears she can see a sliver of guilt flickering to life in the defense attorney's dark eyes, an opportunity.

"What happened?" she demands, truly wanting to understand, needing to know how one of the good guys could go so bad. "You used to make a difference, why did you sell out?"

Caleb lowers his gaze, not quick enough to hide the flare of indignation she notices like fire illuminating his pupils. "Look, my client is forced to work for a man that he cannot fight, and take my word for it, neither can you."

"Let's help each other out here," Kate bargains, latching onto that barely discernible shimmer of remorse in Caleb Brown's eyes and stepping closer. "We can bring down LokSat. I'm giving you a second chance to make a difference."

Caleb purses his lips and leans towards her, a smirk tugging on the edge of his mouth, and her gut twists in warning-

"You think I want to join you and your super spy boyfriend in saving the world?" Caleb inquires and it takes all she has to force her breath to continue out of her lungs, not to catch, for her expression to remain neutral and unfazed despite the sinking of her heart into her stomach. "Though, I have to commend you, Kate. Causing a strictly trained spy to compromise his entire mission for you? Pretty impressive."

Beckett tilts her head to the side in confusion. "I wish I knew what you were talking about."

"You know what I'm actually curious about?" Caleb muses, ignoring her statement, as if she hadn't spoken at all. "How much he told you. We watched you two, on and off over the past couple of months, but well, after Agent Castle essentially defied orders and saved your life from Jerry Tyson, we had to increase our surveillance on him as well. The guy rarely lets you out of his sight, ready to jump in front of a bullet for you, which tells me he's made it personal."

"Suddenly interested in my romantic relationships?" she tosses back, crossing her arms, pressing the limbs hard against her sternum to quell the hammer of her heartbeat beneath.

"Makes me wonder if he whispers top secret information into your ear while you two are cooking dinner, or maybe while you're going over case files together on his couch, lying in bed perhaps," Caleb states, his eyes perusing her body with leisure, but Kate doesn't flinch. Despite the horror that douses her guts at the knowledge.

Caleb's been watching them. Closely.

"Never would have pegged you as a Peeping Tom," Beckett replies, but LokSat's secondhand man merely chuckles in response.

"We've studied you, Kate," he continues, cocking his head at her. "Ever since the Bracken case, you've been a bright red blip on our radar that needs to be wiped out. Which, really, is such a shame. You're quite the rare breed. Not many have your drive, the irritating need to just keep pushing, walk right into a kill zone for the sake of justice."

"You sound like you speak from experience," she comments, but Caleb simply smirks at her, and she realizes she was a fool for thinking that for even a split second she could bring this man onto their side. She had only shown him all their cards instead. "We may be bound by our choices, our mistakes, but they don't have to define us. You don't have to do this."

Caleb shoves his hands into his coat pockets, assesses her with a strange combination of intrigue and pity.

"You and Castle have not been holding up your end of the bargain, Kate. So consider this your final warning," Caleb states, his voice dangerously low, practically growling out the words. "Another step in the wrong direction, and I swear to you, it will not end well."

"If you don't leave now, it won't end well for you either, Caleb."

Kate's gaze startles past Caleb's shoulder to find Castle just inside her office doorway, the look on his face thunderous, more intimidating than she's ever witnessed, and Caleb throws him a grin in answer.

"Wow, you're good, Rick," Caleb commends. "Didn't even hear you enter. What excuse did you give the idiot tech guy in there?"

"What does it matter?" Castle answers, the storm clouds of his eyes darkening.

"I suppose it doesn't," Caleb sighs, turning to face Castle with a smug expression. "Just like your job doesn't seem to matter to you. Her life either, apparently."

"I can take her away, out of the country, if necessary," Castle states, speaking of her as if she isn't standing mere feet away, but Beckett bites back her indignation, forces herself to trust what he's doing.

He would never make her run, knew he could never succeed even if he tried.

Caleb shakes his head and reaches past Castle for the door handle. "It's too late for that. Maybe I was wrong, Kate. Maybe your fate is already sealed."

"No one has to die, Caleb," Castle snaps under his breath before the man can make his exit, but Caleb releases an exaggerated sigh.

"You're pretty naïve for a spy, Rick." The other man steps outside of her office, but his gaze flickers between the two of them, a lethal calm settling in his eyes before a polite smile graces his lips. "I figured you would know by now that someone always has to die."

Kate snags Castle's wrist before he can lunge for the man, before he can make a scene, discretely tugs his body into her side as Caleb strides back towards the elevator with his head held high, the air of his accomplishment accompanying his every step.

"What the hell did you tell him, Kate?" Castle mutters, bringing his unrestrained hand to his face, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

"I didn't tell him anything," she hisses, easing the door shut with a stretch of her arm, a shove of her fingers, and a quiet click. "He made assumptions based on what he's… seen."

The eyes he had screwed shut flare open. "What he's - has he been watching us?"

Kate nods, squeezes the wrist still encased within the cuff of her fingers when she feels his pulse begin to riot with rage beneath.

"He has eyes on the loft, that's all I know," she murmurs, grateful for the lack of activity in the bullpen at this evening hour and lowering her head to Castle's good shoulder, some of his fury deflating beneath the weight of her forehead. "Chess game just got a little more interesting."

"More dangerous," Rick mutters, shaking off her hold on his wrist to catch her fingers, twine their digits for a long moment before he releases her. "We have to move."

Beckett jerks her gaze to his face, but he won't look at her. "Move?"

"I would never ask you to abandon a mission, especially when I know how important it is to you, but we do need to take precautions," Castle begins and she scrapes a hand through her hair, already dreading what comes next, what plan he'll try to enforce on her.

"We've been taking precautions for the last two weeks, Rick," she points out, but he shakes his head.

"We've been watching our backs, playing the game, but we're about to lose, Kate. They're coming for you, without a doubt now that Caleb knows about us, and we can't just remain like sitting ducks," he explains, withdrawing his phone from the inside pocket of his jacket.

"So what do you suggest we do? Because if you think I'm going to run away to another country like you told Caleb-"

"No," Castle huffs. "Not running away. I can't make you stand down, I know that, Kate." His gaze ascends from his phone to meet hers, bore into her, and she braces herself for the inevitable dread. "I am asking you to help me save your life, though."

* * *

She's pissed at him, with the plan, the entire situation, and he can't blame her.

They aren't running, no, but they are going into hiding for a few days and she's far from happy about it. Not that he had expected anything less from her. She wants to face LokSat head on, fight to the death, but that wouldn't work. She would never even learn the face behind the name before she had a bullet in her chest.

Fortunately, despite her overwhelming desire for justice, her drive, Kate could still see the reason in that, realize the logic that came with his plan. He calls up his father's contact on their way back to the loft; he'll explain the turn of events to Hunt, have his handler set them up in a temporary safe house where they can regroup, strategize, and most importantly, stay alive.

The phone only has to ring once before connection is made. Rick hardly manages to get a single word out.

"Hunt, I-"

"Are you insane?" the man answers, cuts him off, anger seething through his words. Angrier than Rick thinks he's ever heard him.

Kate glances to him from her place in the driver's seat, her brow furrowed with a touch of concern as her eyes flick from his face to the phone at his ear.

"Have you lost your mind?" Hunt's voice snaps through the phone like a whip, cracking through Castle's senses, and Rick opens his mouth to speak, but his father is far from finished. "You had one simple job, Richard, a task that is far easier than any other I've assigned you, and _this_ is how you handle it?"

"Sir, I-"

"Just lead her into the trap. That's all you had to do. Just guide her in the right direction."

"Towards the slaughter, you mean?" Castle growls, gripping the phone too tightly. "They're going to kill her-"

"Well, they surely will now, thanks to you," Hunt grumbles and Castle feels his blood boil.

"No, Hunt. They had plans to kill her all along, don't you get it? They were never going to let her live. All you did was send me on an assisted suicide mission," he snarls, hearing Kate's fingers tighten around the leather encasing the steering wheel, catching the shine of her knuckles in the darkness from his peripheral. But nothing else; Hunt is silent on the other line. "You knew, didn't you? Are you - are you a part of this?"

"Son-"

"Do not pull the parental bullshit on me," Rick snaps, slamming his fist down onto his thigh, feeling his flesh bruise beneath his fist, the scar on his shoulder tug in warning. "Why would you - how could you do this? You took an oath-"

"Sometimes, Richard, one makes mistakes in the past that will forever influence their future. I made a deal with a devil long ago and now, I have to honor that, right or wrong," Hunt states, his voice solemn, but it holds no sorrow, no remorse – the man is hardly capable – only acceptance. But like hell is Rick going to accept this.

"Fuck your deals," Castle mutters, concentrating on the restraint of the seatbelt across the quick rise and fall of his chest. They're pulling up along the sidewalk adjacent to his building. Normally, he would have her park farther away, a couple of blocks at least, but he doesn't plan for them to remain here long. "They can't have her."

"They already do."

Rick goes still, cold and terrible dread flushing through his system, drenching his chest in ice water that makes it hard to breathe.

"What does that mean?"

"Their plan is already set into motion and there's nothing I can do to-"

"She's innocent," Castle hisses, unclicking his seatbelt and sitting up straighter while Kate cuts the engine. "You can't just let them-"

"What's done is done," his father murmurs, resigned. "I'm sorry, son."

" _Hunt-_ "

The line goes dead, the call ended, and Rick places the phone face down atop his throbbing quadriceps muscle, tries to ignore the sensation of Kate's eyes on him. Fails.

"I take it your father isn't happy?" she whispers and he slumps back in the passenger seat, closes his eyes and tries to breathe. Fails at that too.

"He knew," Castle tells her, his stomach swirling with gut churning nausea. "All along, the bastard knew what he was sending me into."

Kate sighs and he listens to her shift in the darkness, turning towards him in the quiet.

"How do people do that?" she murmurs, earning the peel of his eyes, the slide of his gaze towards her, silently asking her to elaborate. "How do they just - integrate themselves into someone else's life like you've done to mine, live the lie, and then just detach once it's all over with?"

"I wish I knew," he mumbles, exhaling heavily through his nose. "I've had missions before where I've lied for information, pretended to be someone else entirely to get what I needed from the subject, but I guess I never had what it takes to go deep like that. Biggest downfall, Hunt's always said."

"No," Kate argues, a little too fiercely, but when he glances over to her again, she doesn't back down, her eyes golden flames in the night that fills the inside of the car. "Not a downfall, Rick. Not a weakness. That's - it's a strength. It makes you human."

He holds his breath when she reaches for his cheek, brushes her fingers to his skin before she cradles the side of her face with her palm.

"I'm grateful you didn't become that man, a heartless soldier," she whispers, stroking her thumb to one of the curved lines that bracket his lips, soothing the evidence of his frown. "This is the man I want."

Castle turns to smear his lips to the heel of her palm, closes his eyes once more to the graze of her thumb to his cheekbone, the whorl of her fingertip branding his skin.

"I just wish it could have been different for us," he sighs, directing his gaze to the night sky, illuminated by the glow of the city. "Wish we could have met some other way, been… normal."

Kate huffs a quiet laugh at his side. "Don't be silly, you could never be normal, Castle."

He opens his mouth to protest, but she isn't finished, her thumb tapping at his lip before he can interrupt.

"And I don't wish for any of that," she confesses, lowering her hand from his face, but he catches it before she can draw it back to her lap, tilts his head at her in question. "Unconventional and problematic as it can sometimes prove to be, I like our story."

Castle's lips part in gentle surprise. "You do?"

"I do," she confirms, unbuckling her seatbelt with her free hand so she can stretch across the console, stain a kiss to his mouth that he catches with his teeth, his hand at her jaw, holding her there for a second longer.

The last hour has been pure chaos, stress and anxiety combining forces to beat against his skull, twist through his stomach, but sitting with Kate in the darkness of her parked cruiser, having all of his doubts and fears soothed with the seal of her mouth and the promise of her words, helps him breathe again. Like he's been running a marathon all this time and she's his chance for rest, for salvation.

"Kate, I-"

"We should go," she sighs against his lips, nudging her nose to his cheek before drawing back and reaching for the car door handle. "It's getting late and I don't… well, I have no idea where we're going."

"Without my father's help, we're going rogue," he murmurs, shoving his own door open.

"Rogue?" Kate repeats, slipping out of the car, meeting him on the sidewalk with her brow in a troubled crease.

"I have a place, off the grid," he murmurs, his lips practically at her ear to avoid any risk of being heard. "Not far, but we should be safe there, especially if we have a head start. An advantage."

"When do I get to know where this secret safe house is, Agent Castle?" she inquires, looping her arm through his as they start across the street, towards the entrance of his building. Cooper, the doorman that had been placed on sight, is missing again and it sets his already simmering nerves aflame.

But he ignores the burn and leads Kate inside, nudging her towards the rarely used stairwell, and squeezes her arm before he releases her. "When we get there."

She scowls at him for the response, but climbs up the stairs without a returning retort, ascending the five floor walkup without breaking a sweat while he follows from behind, checking over his shoulder every few steps. Beckett is the one to fish a key from the pocket of her leather jacket, the metal gleaming between her fingers once they reach his floor, and he retrieves his phone for a second time.

Something's not right.

"Are we just packing the essentials?" she questions over her shoulder, her voice low, a whisper, but too loud in the empty hallway, and Castle nods his head.

"Yeah, anything else, we can buy along the way," he murmurs, typing out a text message, but his finger pause over the keyboard midsentence as Beckett unlocks the front door, eases it open with her shoulder.

The alarm bells in his head have been triggered, his instincts screaming for them not to go inside, but before he can grab her, stop her, Kate is already stepping through the front door, disappearing inside the loft.

He presses send.

"Kate, wait," he calls, shoving his phone back into his jeans and jogging to reach her, his heart seizing in his chest when he bounds through the open doorway.

" _Castle-_ " But her gasp of warning comes too late, Caleb has a gun to her head and someone just knocked him in the skull with what feels like the butt of another weapon, has him collapsing to his knees, his vision going dark before he can stop them, save her. He has to save her, has to - but she's fading, his world painted black as his cheek hits the hardwood of the floor.


	17. Chapter 17

She watches them strap him to a table, a menacing looking piece of furniture that has his arms outstretched, his ankles and wrists bound, his neck slumped forward while his head hangs limp like a ragdoll's.

"The least you could do is adjust his neck," Kate rasps, her voice still rough from her time unconscious in the back of the van that Caleb and the creep preparing an IV for Castle had used to transfer them to this place. Wherever they are.

She had only caught glimpses while being hauled out of the vehicle, darkness and shards of bright lights before they had been dragged into this room, all fluorescent lighting and sterile fixtures that resemble instruments from Lanie's workspace at the morgue. Caleb had tied her to a chair, her wrists bound at her back with plastic ties, her feet duct taped to the legs, the entire ordeal forcing her to remain awake. But Castle is still out cold.

"I wouldn't be worried about your boyfriend right now, Kate," Caleb quips, fastening the final strap across Rick's chest with a harsh tug that has him grunting in his sleep. "His daddy will likely get him out of this, but you… it's not looking too good for you at the moment."

"If you're so hell-bent on killing me, what's the point of this?" Beckett growls, her eyes darting to the other man, small and puny, a lackey she'd heard Caleb refer to as 'Flynn', who is checking on a bag of fluids that glows bright blue.

"Killing you without ensuring that we have everything we need from you? Not our style," Caleb chuckles, turning to face her with a sigh. "Believe me when I say that I wished it hadn't come to this, Kate. I'd honestly been rooting for you to stick around a little longer, maybe even come over to our side."

"Go to hell," she bites out, earning a smirk in reply.

"Yeah, I figured you'd feel that way. But who knows, maybe Mason can convince you."

"Mason?" she echoes, a name she's never heard before.

"Ah, I shouldn't spoil anything until he gets here," Caleb states, turning away from her, cutting her off before she can attempt to interrogate him further. "How long until he wakes up? I know Vikram didn't hit him that hard."

"Should be any second now," Flynn murmurs, tapping the needle attached to the IV before crouching over Castle's exposed forearm, the pierce of pain waking him with a start.

"Get off me," he growls before he can even open his eyes, but the second they do fly open, his gaze lands on her, the horror bleeding into his features. "Let her go. Right now, let her-"

"Enough with the self-righteous hero bullshit, Agent Castle," Caleb sighs and Rick's head whips towards the man he had yet to see, his chest straining against his confines. "We both know you were never meant to be the good guy, why do you think you were brought in on this mission?"

"Because my father is an idiot," Castle mutters, yanking his arm against the leather restraints, earning a huff of irritation from Flynn, who is still attempting to secure the IV in Rick's forearm.

"Can you please stop moving? You're making this far more difficult than it needs to be."

Castle jerks harder, much to Kate's satisfaction, but he goes still when Caleb steps up beside her, touches the muzzle of his Glock to her kneecap.

"Well, would you look at that?" Caleb muses, tapping her knee once before drawing the gun back to his side holster. "We may not need the chemical truth agent at all."

"That hasn't been approved," Castle grunts, gritting his teeth as Flynn tapes the inserted needle to the inside of Rick's elbow, straightens out the line of fluid flowing into his arm. "And if you think that some truth serum is going to get me to talk, then you've obviously skipped over my file. I've been tortured with far worse and managed to keep my mouth shut."

"We know exactly what we're dealing with when it comes to you and Captain Beckett," Flynn quips, tapping the plastic bag. "Within the next few minutes, you will tell me everything we want to know, and then we will dispose of you."

"You can't kill him," Kate points out, her heart skipping and stumbling with painful uncertainty. "You'd never get away with it."

"Did I say _kill,_ Ms. Beckett?" Flynn inquires with an arch of his brow. "I'm sure Agent Castle will be handled accordingly."

"You worry too much, Kate," Caleb muses, strolling around to stand behind her, his hands closing around her shoulders, seeking a reaction from Rick that she attempts to subdue with the rise of her gaze, the barely discernable shake of her head. "Too much about other people, more specifically. If you'd just concentrate on yourself, I don't think you'd be here right now."

"You mean if I just let the deaths of my AG team go without avenging them?" she tosses back in disgust. "Just turn the other cheek like a coward, like you?"

Caleb laughs before his fingers tighten around her shoulders, his grip bruising, crushing her bones. "My job is the opposite of cowardly, Captain Beckett. But we're not here to talk about me. Flynn, are you good here until Mason arrives?"

Flynn offers a nod, his concentration more prominently on the clipboard in his hands, littered with lines of print, ample empty space for notes. "Just fine."

"Well, I guess this is it. Agent Castle, until we meet again." Caleb releases her shoulders to stride forward, but he glances back before he can reach the exit, the coals of his eyes alight with a glittering mixture of pity and satisfaction when he snags her gaze. "It was a privilege to know you, Kate."

Castle jerks his shoulder forward, the table rattling with the force of his movement, but there is no give to the restraints, no sign of hope as the door slams shut behind Caleb Brown.

"Rick, stop," she breathes, balling her fists behind her back to test the cord of plastic binding them, flexing her calf muscles to feel the sliver of space she had managed to create between her leg and the duct tape. "Your shoulder-"

"Forget about my shoulder," he growls, squirming when Flynn taps a button on the metal edge of the table, causes it to tilt. "Are you okay? Did they hurt you?"

"No, I'm fine," she sighs the reassurance that does little to comfort him.

"Agent Castle," Flynn begins, taking a stand beside the table and consulting the papers in his hands. "I'm going to ask you some questions-"

"Fuck you," Rick seethes, the veins of his forearms bulging, rising to the surface at the flex of his fists.

"Which you will feel compelled to answer truthfully despite your emotional response to them," the other man finishes without flinching when Castle rattles the table again with a sharp rock of his body.

"I'll kill you first," Castle mutters, glaring at the other man, the defenseless LokSat employee. "Snap your neck and-"

"Threats will get you nowhere, Agent," Flynn informs him calmly. "You will be on severe probation once this ordeal is over with and I will be under protection, as I have been for the majority of my life, therefore, unreachable to you when you attempt to carry out your inevitable plot of vengeance at some future date. Now, please stop thrashing on my table."

Rick scowls, squirms in defiance like a child, but it causes Flynn no concern.

"But first thing's first. Captain Beckett," he states, reaching behind him, into one of the several metal drawers lining his desk and withdrawing a roll of duct tape. "I wish I didn't have to do this, but I'm under orders to silence you during the interrogation portion of this situation."

The glare Castle produces is truly menacing, intimidating, even for a sociopath like Flynn if the slight detour he takes on his way to where she's stationed feet away from the front of the table, venturing around the back of the surface to reach her, is any indication.

"Don't touch her."

"I'm simply going to place a strip of tape over her mouth, Agent Castle. No harm will-"

The jolting shake of the table is a bit more promising this time as Castle lurches his body forward and she's prepared to do the same, thrust forward and headbutt the scrawny man in front of her, but Flynn is smart, stepping up behind her and sealing the strip of tape over her mouth before she can attempt any form of blow.

"There, not so bad, was it?" She hopes he can hear the growl in her throat as he drifts away from her, back to his station alongside Castle. "Now, let's begin."

"I won't," Castle growls, but she can see the beads of sweat gathering along his forehead, the physical evidence of stress, and it has her stomach twisting harder. She's never seen him so out of control, not outside of the bedroom, and if Castle can't get them out of this…

"Did you share confidential information with Katherine Beckett?"

She watches Castle grit his teeth, the tendons along his neck bulging with strain before the word grinds past his lips and her heart finally sinks. "Yes."

"Did you and/or Beckett share said information with any other parties?"

Castle scoffs, shakes his head, but the words crawl to the surface nonetheless. "No. Of course not."

Flynn takes notes on his clipboard, quick and efficient, the actual answers he's writing down hardly fazing him. "How far along into the mission before Beckett became aware of your true intentions?"

Her chest clenches as she continues to witness him fight the drug coursing through his system, shoving truths up his throat and forcing them out of his mouth.

"Around a month," he admits, glaring up at the ceiling.

Flynn glances down to his clipboard. "Why did you tell her the truth when you were under strict orders to do the opposite?"

"Because she needed to know," Castle bites out, not even trying to hold that one back, and Flynn momentarily lowers his clipboard to his lap, offers Rick an inquisitive look.

"This is more of a personal question, but as someone who was raised by the state, never had a family growing up, I never knew love, and I thought… I imagined you would be quite similar. But you aren't," Flynn assesses, his eyes traveling over Castle's face as if he's some sort of odd experiment, a conundrum. "You should be cold, willing to follow orders without issues, and yet… you defy them, put everything on the line for a woman who you had to know was marked for death no matter the outcome of this mission."

Castle doesn't speak, his lips pursed in a thin line, and all she can do is watch, her mouth taped shut, and listen.

"What did she do to you?" Flynn inquires, so intensely curious, thirsty for answer, an explanation. "What drove you to make such stupid decisions?"

Rick scoffs, a hollow laugh that echoes through the room. "If you consult with my father, you'll learn I'm an expert at stupid decisions by his standards."

"That is not what I asked you," Flynn sighs, tapping his ballpoint pen along the thin clipboard still in his hands. "There is usually only one human emotion responsible for this kind of recklessness. So, is it love, Agent Castle? Did you fall in love with Katherine Beckett?"

Castle's eyes flicker towards her, his expression neutral, calm, but she can read the panic bleeding into his irises, his lips trembling in their effort to restrain his response from slipping free, but she already knows what it will be.

"Yes," he finally breathes, his eyes fluttering shut.

"Why?" Flynn asks, as if he just can't understand, the prospect of love bewildering to him.

"Because I'd never met anyone like her," Castle replies, opening his eyes to seek hers, the bleakness of their current predicament falling away for just a moment.

"Well, you've never met anyone like me, I'm assuming. So the fact that she was different, that doesn't constitute love, does it?"

"You don't have the legs," Rick muses, the corner of his mouth quirking for her. "Or the eyes, the brain, the heart. She makes me laugh, challenges me like no one else ever has before. Kate… in the short time, I've known her, has made me want to be a better man."

"But these feelings, you should know more than most how vulnerable they make you? Before her, you were successful in your career, and now, you'll be lucky to even keep it," Flynn points out, his brow in a deep crease and his lips in an unpleasant frown. "I just can't comprehend what would motivate someone to throw their entire life away for someone else."

"Because before her, I was existing in a life chosen for me, no destination in mind, no desire for anything more than what I had," Rick murmurs, telling it all to her, not sparing Flynn a second glance, and Kate flexes the muscles of her calves, feels the tape give just a fraction more. "I was empty."

"Wouldn't you rather be empty than strapped to a table, spilling your guts against your will, preparing to watch her die?"

"I won't let her die," Castle growls, but Flynn isn't fazed, too caught up in his line of questioning.

"If you had never met the woman sitting across from you right now, you would likely have a long life ahead of you, not factoring in the risks of your job… surely, you would take a do over? The chance to never meet her at all?"

The only form of communication they have is the collision of gazes, speaking without words, and Castle uses it, holds her eyes as his shine a beautiful cerulean with ripples of gold despite the harsh lighting. All the answer she needs.

"No, I wouldn't."

She hopes he can determine the shape of her smile beneath the tape, the lack of doubt, and returning sentiment in her eyes.

"Hmm, interesting," Flynn mumbles, making a note on a separate sheet of paper. "I wish I had more time, to study you both, but unfortunately, Kate Beckett will be dead by the end of the night and you… well, I suppose it's up to your father and Mason when it comes to you."

"You-"

"Mr. Flynn," a foreign voice calls, but Castle straightens up at the sound, his head swinging towards it. As if he recognizes it. "Have you gotten everything necessary from Agent Castle?"

"Yes, sir," Flynn answers, rising from his stool next to the table. "Not that there was much for him to tell, really. Though, it was quite an interesting chat we had."

"Good to hear it," the man congratulates. He's older, she notes as he comes into view, balding and with strips of white peppering the sides of his head, forming a light mustache atop his lips. She's never seen him before, but apparently, Rick has.

"North?" he gets out once the man is standing beside him, his arms crossed in disapproval like the frown on his lips.

"It's actually Wood. Mason Wood. North was just one of my aliases that I used more frequently here at the CIA," the man explains with a shrug. "I had such high hopes for you, Rick. Never would have pinned you as the type to be thrown off by a woman. Though, we all have our moments of weakness."

"Why are you doing this? How could the CIA condone your work as LokSat?" Castle demands, but Mason Wood shakes his head.

"LokSat is one of my more… extralegal forms of activity, but really, that isn't important, Rick. The only thing you should be focused on right now is the consequences of your actions," Mason informs him, but Castle surges against the restraints across his chest.

Flynn has yet to notice, but while Beckett's been attempting to wear down the tape at her ankles, Castle has been loosening the straps at his wrists.

"Just let her go, N- Wood. She knows the truth, she'll stop now, just like she did with Bracken," Castle bargains, but Wood clicks his tongue in disagreement.

"She kept a deal going with Bracken for a while, yes, but come on now, we both know how Katherine Beckett operates. She had no intention of letting it go, isn't that right, Kate?"

She arches an eyebrow when Mason Wood turns towards her for the first time and he huffs, steps forward and reaches for her, earning a growl of warning from Castle.

"I'm just removing the tape, Agent. Calm down," Mason sighs in exasperation, easing the tape from across her lips, stripping it from her skin with a quick tug. "Nice to meet you, Captain. I must commend you for how you managed to work over a trained agent with such apparent ease."

"I didn't work him over," Kate snaps, clearing her throat when she words scratch past her lips. "I never even knew the truth, not until recently."

"Because he felt compelled to tell you, because _you_ became special to him, built a bond with him within a matter of mere weeks. Do you know how valuable of a skill that is? To make people care about you so quickly? You would work wonders in our field," Mason muses, straightening in front of her, blocking Castle from her line of sight. "How opposed would you be to a job offer?"

"Is that the deal then? Work for you, save my life?" she mutters, slicking her tongue over the split corner of her lip where Caleb had smacked her with the gun earlier, catching the metallic tang of blood on her taste buds.

"Well, it's never that easy, but if you want it summed up, yes," Mason nods. "I know it seems so terrible now, like I'm the big bad guy in all of this, but the dark side of the CIA can be the best side if you give it a chance. We're the ones who do what needs to be done, just without the credit."

Beckett glares up into the ice blue chasms of Mason Wood's eyes, swallows hard.

"Never in a million years."

Wood sighs, that disappointed frown tugging his lips downwards once more. "That is unfortunate, Captain Beckett. I had hoped that we would come to some form of understanding, spare your life in the process."

Wood withdraws the gun from beneath his jacket, checks the magazine before clicking off the safety.

"It really is such a waste, but I gave you a choice. Even before all of this, you had a choice. Could have walked away."

Castle is thrashing behind the man, the entire table trembling with the force of his struggle, his shouts, but Wood ignores him, raises the barrel of the gun to kiss Beckett's forehead as her heart begins to hammer through her chest.

"I took an oath, people that I cared about were murdered, and they deserve justice," she tells him, not backing down, her head held high and the glare she pins on him unwavering.

"It must have been hard carrying that weight, especially after only just being relieved of the one your mother's murder left on your shoulders for so long," Mason murmurs, his voice soaked in understanding that she doesn't buy.

"It got easier when I stopped having to carry it alone," she admits, listening to Castle's efforts quiet for just a moment before starting up again with fierce intensity that has Mr. Flynn backing away with caution.

"Mm, well, at least you will die knowing your death will be a lesson for Agent Castle, a way of learning from his mistakes."

"I don't regret it," she whispers, hoping that Castle hears her. "I'd do it all again, Rick."

"Very sweet of you," Mason mumbles, adjusting his finger atop the trigger, and Kate closes her eyes.

And in that split second of darkness, the short-lived breath of acceptance, a deafening crash has them flaring back open to see Castle breaking free of the table's restraints, his legs still bound, but his arms hooking around Mason's neck, dragging him backwards into a chokehold.

The gun clatters to the floor at Beckett's feet.

"Oh no," Flynn mumbles, rushing forward, but no way is this guy going to be the one to stop them when they are so close to escaping this ordeal with their lives.

Flynn scrambles towards her for the gun and Beckett uses momentum to shift forward, gaining enough balance with her feet touching the ground to swing herself and the chair around, slam straight into Flynn's torso and send them both crashing to the floor.

She grunts at the harsh landing, stuck on her side for a moment before she realizes the chair has taken the brunt of the fall, lost its legs in the aftermath. She can stand.

Flynn groans, his body lying against a row of metal cabinets and his eyes screwed shut in pain, and Beckett pushes to her feet, awkward with the wooden legs of the chair still taped to her calves, but it doesn't stop her from standing, shimmying her arms up and over the head of the chair, listening to the beautiful sound of it dislodging from her back and clattering to the floor.

Mason is choking as she stumbles towards the gun just inches away from the struggle taking place, his eyes wide and bloodshot, the skin of his face flaring red, but he's still coherent enough to kick out when she draws near, land a sharp smack of his foot to her ribcage that has her breath catching. He cries out in agony after that, a choked, brutal sound, and she doesn't have to look up to know that Castle's found a way to punish him further for the move.

"Kate," Castle calls out, his voice firm now, in control, increasing her confidence. "Get the gun, sweetheart."

"Don't - don't call me that," she wheezes, snagging the piece from the floor and balancing it between her still bound hands.

It nearly goes sailing again when Flynn slams into her back, has her pitching forward and descending to the floor once more, her knees cracking hard against the linoleum, but she cradles the gun to her chest even as she falls, rolls to her back, and manages a well-practiced kick to Flynn's jaw that has him swaying on his feet before he collapses unconscious to the ground.

It's seconds before Mason is too.

Mason's body crashes at his feet and Rick slumps back against the table for a heartbeat, sucks in a ragged breath.

"Castle, did you-"

"No, he just passed out," Rick assures her, exhaling and attempting to bend over, shove Mason out of the way to reach the straps at his feet, but Kate steps in, hands him the gun while she hooks her hands under Mason's arms to drag him to the side, drop him next to Flynn.

"Are you okay?" she murmurs, returning to unstrap the bindings at his ankles with trembling fingers.

"I'm fine." But he's not, she can hear it solely from his voice that he's far from, but the second she frees his other leg from the restraints, he's staggering off of the table, hauling her up and banding his arms around her body tight enough to bruise. But it feels good, so comforting to be buried in his embrace. "Shit, Kate, you're still all tied up and taped to pieces of a chair."

She chokes out a laugh against his neck. "Not how I intended our first attempt at bondage to go."

He gasps and she tilts her head back to see him, revel in the sight of him free and smiling and so openly in love with her.

"Rick-"

"Old man should have listened to me." The fire of a gun bursts through the air in the same instant that her gaze snaps upwards, past Castle's shoulder to see Caleb in the opened doorway, his weapon raised from the shot that has Rick's body seizing against hers. "Told him just to kill you both, toss your bodies in an incinerator, and be done with it."

"Castle," she gasps, feeling him begin to sway, the blood oozing from his chest to stain hers, and no, _no_ , not like this.

"And it would have been far less painful for us all."

Caleb hasn't seen the gun still cradled between her bound hands, curled at Castle's chest, and she takes a single, stuttering breath before she maneuvers her arms over Rick's shoulders, gritting her teeth as Castle slips to his knees in front of her, crumples at her feet.

Brown is quick, returning fire the second she pulls the trigger, but Beckett barely registers the sharp pang that cuts through her upper body, forces her left shoulder to spasm at the hit, her attention trained to the falter of Caleb's body at the bullet that's punctured his shoulder.

Kate shoots again, shoots until he's down, until the magazine of her gun is empty and she's hit her true target multiple times.

"Beckett! Castle!" She can hear the yelling, familiar voices shouting their names, but it isn't until Caleb is stumbling back into the clear white wall, staining it with smears of crimson as he collapses against the surface with an expression of shock engulfing his face, that she can recognize them.

Ryan and Esposito.

But she can't even begin to process how her boys would know their location, how they got so lucky; she can't even manage to stay on her feet.

Kate staggers to her knees, the searing spread of a bullet consuming her chest, consuming everything as her vision goes black, but she sees him when she hits the floor, sees Castle staring back at her, choking on stuttering gasps for breath.

"Rick," she rasps, her body crumpled and defeated right next to his, close enough for her to reach out, claim his hand and cling to the fading light of his eyes. "Castle."

"Here," he breathes, wheezes, and she's already losing him, losing him like everyone else, and she squeezes his hand, locks her fingers with his. She doesn't want to lose him too; she won't survive losing this man who saw something in her that no one else ever has, who has loved her in a way no other could.

"Stay - stay with me," she gets out, attempting to tighten the twine of her fingers through his, but her hands feel numb. "Rick-"

"With you," he promises, the faint squeeze of his hand registering for a split second. "Be okay, Kate."

She can't lose him too.

"They're in here!" She can hear Esposito shouting, a stampede of footsteps following, but the blood weeping from her chest is thick and warm, the blackness caressing the edges of her vision, the embrace of sleep so near, but Castle - she has to tell him- "God, I need a medic! Get paramedics in here _now_!"

"Cas-" She struggles to part her lips, to speak without slurring her words and untangle them from the deadweight of her tongue, to hold on just a moment longer. To stay with him, to say it. "Love you too."


	18. Chapter 18

Being shot in the chest is excruciating. He's been shot plenty of times before, bullets finding homes in a multitude of other places amidst his body; he's suffered stabbings, internal bruising and bleeding, broken bones, poisonings that have taken him as close to death as one can get, but somehow, none of those injuries seem to compare to that of the current gunshot wound that has overtaken his sternum.

"Mr. Smith?" He hears the voice of his doctor at the end of the hall, calling out for his escapee patient for what had to be the third time in Rick's 48 hours spent in the hospital, the man's voice drowned in exasperation this time.

But Castle's a spy and he can breathe properly now – to an extent – without feeling as if his entire chest will cave in, and he refuses to be caught this time before he can find what he's looking for.

He shuffles farther down the hall, slips into an empty patient room when he hears quickening footsteps nearby, and rests his back to the wall beside the door. His upper body is on fire, flames licking along his insides, turning his heart and lungs to ash, burning the bones of his ribcage like firewood.

The image of her bleeding out right beside him on the floor flashes through his mind and Rick grits his teeth. He had been unconscious for over 24 hours, had spent another fighting to stay awake, to learn the whereabouts of Kate Beckett, but no one would even acknowledge him when he asked about her.

He really had no other choice.

Rick steals a glimpse outside the hall, finds the narrow corridor bare save for a few nurses too busy attending to other patients to notice a man in stolen scrubs, shambling down the halls and on the verge of collapsing. He inhales another shallow breath, returns to the mission at hand and proceeds to search every room for her, until-

"Castle?"

His head jerks up at the sound of a voice he actually knows for the first time since he had awoken, never so grateful to see Kevin Ryan in his entire time of knowing the detective.

"Ryan," he wheezes, biting his cheek to ignore the lancing pain through his chest, watching Ryan's eyes flare bright blue with concern as he scrambles forward, takes one of Castle's forearms to steady him. "Where is she? Where's Kate?"

The same words he's said over a thousand times now.

"Right down the hall, but she's still unconscious-"

"Can you take me to her? Please," Castle grits out, pursing his lips and feeling his fresh set of stitches tug in familiar warning, the phantom threads in his shoulder echoing the flaring sensation.

"Yeah, sure," Ryan murmurs, assessing Castle's bright green scrubs with confusion. "We tried to find you after you and Beckett were both admitted, but they said there was no one by your name in this hospital."

"Must have been a mix up," Castle mutters, shuffling forward with Ryan at his side, ready to catch him if he goes down. There's a rather large possibility that he might.

Rick knows he'll have to tell the boys about his true identity at some point, they're too important to Kate, too close to him now, to be fooled for much longer. But he's far too exhausted, too drained of everything but the need to see her, to fathom how that conversation will go.

"By the way, how'd you - find us?"

"Your text message," Ryan answers with ease. "Your unfinished SOS was enough for Esposito to know something was up, so we tracked the device until it lost signal outside that CIA office in Midtown where you and Beckett were being held."

"Good timing," Rick breathes out, hoping they're close to Beckett's room before his legs decide to give out too.

"Castle, are you sure you're supposed to be-"

"Is this her room?" Castle cuts in, nodding to the hospital room they've come to a stop in front of, and Ryan sighs but nods, pushing the door open for him.

"But it isn't my fault if you get in trouble for this."

Ryan's words fall faint and muffled to Castle's ears, his focus zeroing in on the woman in the hospital bed mere feet away, wires extending from her arm and a tube down her throat, her face slack with sleep, and he's almost able to forget the agony raging through his system as he staggers towards her.

It takes him a few seconds to reach her, having to resort to a quickened shuffle to cross the room without hitting the floor, and once he finally makes it to her bedside, he can see how pale and papery her skin is, how fragile the bones that sit more prominently than ever beneath her flesh appear, how much damage he's allowed her to suffer.

He's never imagined Kate Beckett so breakable.

But she's alive. She lives and that's all that matters to him, all that's ever mattered.

"They said she'll probably wake soon, then they can take her off the vent," Ryan's voice chimes in hopefully, and Castle offers the other man an apologetic lift of his eyes, completely forgetting he was there.

Rick touches trembling fingers to the slash of her cheekbone, represses the shudder that threatens to wrack his frame at the waxy feel of her skin beneath his fingertips. "Good. Where's Esposito?"

"He's made it his personal mission to make Mason Wood and John Flynn pay for what they've done," Ryan informs him and something in Castle's chest - something that isn't bullet related splinters of pain - eases. "Caleb Brown is dead. Vikram is in holding as we speak. Everything concerning LokSat is being brought to light."

Castle grips the edge of Kate's hospital bed before he returns his gaze to Ryan, the inquisitive expression claiming the detective's face, and he doesn't have to guess to know that Javier Esposito and Kevin Ryan have put the clues together pretty quickly within these past 48 hours.

"I won't ask right now, but the truth would be appreciated at some point, Castle. You owe us that much, owe her that much."

"She already knows everything," Castle confesses, brushing back an oily strand of her hair from her skin, stroking the tips of his fingers along her hairline. "Just - just wanted to-"

"Castle?" He attempts to blink away the swirl of dizziness obscuring his view of her, tries to find his center, but his body is already shutting down on him, giving up and going sideways. "Hey, you should really sit-"

"Keep her safe," Rick slurs, his world spinning as gravity betrays him and his balance disappears.

He can hear Ryan rushing towards him, managing to ease his descent to the floor before he can completely collapse.

"She's safe, Castle. You're both safe, don't worry."

And with that, Rick's unseeing eyes finally stop fighting their inevitable close.

* * *

The next time Castle wakes, he's back in the damn hospital bed.

He grunts in frustration, sick of being held like a prisoner, but when he shifts to assess his surroundings, he finds that he's no longer being kept within the solitary confinement of his room, that he's not in his former hospital room at all.

Kate is watching him from only a few feet away on the bed he had passed out beside, her body angled towards him, her eyes tired and half lidded, fighting to stay open. Her lips rise into a gentle smile for him, a tender thing that threatens to fall apart at any moment, send him crumbling right along with it.

"Kate," he breathes, her name a sigh of relief that causes his chest to burn, but his heart exalts at the sight of her awake, the proof of her survival staring back at him.

She was battered and broken, the stains of purple beneath her eyes a striking violet, the mess of her hair limp and falling free of the French braid a nurse must have tied it into for her, and the resounding beep of her heart monitor the only sound she can currently emit, her throat likely still raw from the chest tube.

He doesn't think he's ever seen a more beautiful sight.

She manages a barely discernible sound of reproach when he moves to maneuver himself from the bed, though, her eyebrows drawn down in disapproval and her fingers lifting from her side in silent command.

 _Stay_.

Castle sighs but follows her request, relaxes back into the elevated head of the bed, but he doesn't tear his eyes away from her. He yearns to assess every injury, to learn every mark on her body that she had gained at the hands of Caleb Brown, Mason Wood, and potentially Vikram Singh. He wanted to memorize every cut and bruise, every detail concerning the bandaged area beneath her right collarbone where a bullet hole resides, and recreate each wound on the two remaining men still alive, make them hurt like she does. Only worse.

The quiet sound of her hum draws his eyes up from where he had unknowingly allowed them to settle on the bandage peeking out at him beneath her hospital gown. The blink of her eyes is growing heavier, the rise of her lids slower, and he wishes he could crawl in beside her, at least have his hospital bed pushed up against hers rather than allow a few empty feet of floor space to separate them.

But his body is spent and so is hers and when her eyes fail to open again, he finds his own following suit, the weightlessness of the morphine causing him to drift.

* * *

It takes another day for him to finally maneuver himself into Kate's hospital bed, relishing in the bright ripples of amusement in her gaze while he manages to slip in beside her before Doctor Davidson can catch him. Castle has driven the surgeon crazy over the last three days and he knows that once the doctor comes to find him settled beside her, stable and content, the other man will merely shake his head in exasperation, mutter about how he gives up on the two of them.

And hopefully stop shooting Kate those infuriating smiles.

"How are you?" Kate whispers, her throat scraped raw for a second time in only three short weeks. He had woken yesterday to the doctor and nurses removing her chest tube, able to register the noise of her trying not to choke through the muffle and blur of sleep dragging him back down, the agonizing sound of her failing not to vomit once the tube was gone and she had to breathe on her own.

The gunshot wound below her collarbone will heal without issue, Davidson had promised him that, and so would his bullet to the chest, but neither recovery would be easy, of that he had assured them as well.

"I've been better," Castle replies, squeezing the back of her knee. She's propped on her left side with her legs curled at his hip, the two of them elevated into a sitting position due to the bed, attempting not to tangle up their IVs. "I'd kinda hoped to make it out of there unscathed."

"Mm, too easy. Not our style," she muses, her lips twitching in the corners, eradicating some of the stiffness from her features. "Espo and Ryan came by this morning while you were still asleep, told me they've got Wood, Flynn, and Vikram in custody."

Castle hums his assent, outlines the bone of her patella with his thumb. "They'll pay for everything they've done, Kate. I promise you. You can have your life back now."

Kate lowers her cheek to his untouched shoulder, one of the few places left on him not marred by a gunshot wound or stained in a mosaic of bruises, and Castle embraces the flirt of her fingers along the top of his hand, flipping his palm upwards to catch them.

"No, I can't," she murmurs, causing his brow to furrow, his fingers squeezing hers in askance. "And I think it's a good thing."

"Beckett, I am way too doped up on pain meds right now to understand anything other than the obvious, so be more specific."

Her laugh is raspy, raked over the sandpaper surface of her throat. "I just meant that my entire life is changed. Yeah, I'm glad I don't have to constantly worry about someone killing me, but… it'll never be the life I knew."

Castle swallows. "And that's a good thing?"

The movement of her chin alerts him to the barely discernible nod she manages. "Yeah, it's good. Before this, it was - pretty hollow. Old life… didn't have you."

His chest flares with the sharp stutter of his breath. "Kate-"

"I want to go away for a while," she confesses on a whisper into the fabric of his hospital gown, and Castle traps her fluttering fingers, ceases their tracings of his hand's heartlines.

"Wherever you want," he answers instantly, brushing his thumb along the slender length of her index finger. "As soon as we're both released, we'll go wherever you want, Kate."

"What if you _aren't_ released, Rick?" she questions, recovering quickly from her admissions, her hand curling inwards and halting the caress of his thumb. "LokSat may be finished and I may be free of them, but they were going to keep you alive, give you back to the CIA-"

"I'm not their property," he mutters, swallowing down his leftover outrage towards Jackson Hunt, towards the agency in general. "You made me see that."

Kate's lips part, her brow still in a furrow that he can feel against his shoulder, far too troubled for his liking, and Rick releases a careful sigh, wincing at the subtle but agonizing expand of his chest.

"I meant every word I said to you in front of Flynn. You made me a better man, Kate. You make me want things and I won't give that up, especially not for some job I hardly liked to begin with."

He feels her head lift from his shoulder and Castle gingerly turns to find her gaze, her eyes gentle and gold in the harsh lighting, raw and more exposed than he's ever seen. Kate Beckett had told him that she loved him before they had both succumbed to the persistent draw of unconsciousness and as he studies her now, he sees every defense he's ever known her to possess gone, the walls that had been built as high as his now nothing more than rubble that she sweeps away with every blink. It makes the declaration all the more real. Makes him believe her words without any of the doubts he would normally harbor.

"I meant what I said too, Castle," she murmurs with a quirk of her lips and a sparkle rippling through her irises. "But is it really that easy to just leave the CIA? I mean, you weren't even allowed to be permitted into the hospital with me under your current alias."

"That was my father's doing," Castle sighs, trying not to think about the man who had betrayed him, the man who was supposed to love him, a man he had yet to see since his awakening in his hospital room. The only person he'd had left. "But he won't hold me in the agency against my will. He cares more about his work than anything else and I haven't been benefiting his career for a while now."

Kate's eyes roam his face as her brow scrunches, but he has no clue what she's searching for, or if she finds it, only that she's leaning forward a second later, dusting her lips to the unshaven expanse of his skin.

"Your father's an idiot. I want you to meet mine," she murmurs suddenly, a laugh skittering out across his cheek when he startles in response, hisses at the way it jars his sternum. Her father hadn't been notified of her shooting due to the nature of the case, no one aside from Ryan and Esposito had been, but he'll get her a phone today, encourage her to give Jim Beckett a call. "I want us to visit him at his cabin once we're both healed," she continues, softer now as her fingertips stroke the inside of his wrist. "You'll love it there, Rick."

The scarce amount of oxygen he had left in his lungs evacuates, threatens to choke him on its way up his trachea.

"Okay," he breathes without thinking, images of meeting an older Beckett flooding through his mind, a father who Rick knows had lost it all in his grief only to rebuild, become a better man for his daughter. Ideas of gaining the other man's acceptance, of staying with her in a cozy log cabin and learning what it's like to become part of the tight-knit, two person family over time, already rushing in to fill his brain. And it terrifies him in ways he had never experienced, but he finds his want for these foreign things, the desire to have this life he's only ever daydreamed about, is stronger than his fears. "And - and before that?"

"I want to go somewhere safe, somewhere beautiful to recover," she whispers, her words slurring ever so slightly and the gentle tilt of her body growing heavier against the curved edge of his shoulder. "See the world with you when we're better."

Castle's eyebrows hitch high, but he knows it must be the pain meds talking, the sliver of morphine - that she had argued so vehemently against allowing into her bloodstream - seducing her mind into indulging fantasies of a future they had discussed once before.

"We're going on that European adventure we talked about after all?" he asks, feeling her smile bloom, grazing the corner of his mouth before she draws back.

"Mm, I heard Paris is pretty nice in the fall," she muses, her eyes hazy but alight for him.

"Oh Beckett, I'd take you somewhere far better than Paris," he hums, earning a glimpse of her teeth between the stretch of her lips.

"Yeah? Just tell me what kind of weather to pack for," she returns, amusement dancing in her gaze, but ultimately, she's… serious.

"What - what about work?" And he knows that even if she is truly considering an international getaway with him in the future, it's not the time for these questions. But his mind is already whirring with the possibilities, with wonderings of what lies ahead, what came after this dream vacation.

Kate merely hums in reply, returns her head to his shoulder and grits her teeth as she shifts, arranges herself more comfortably against his side in the cramped hospital bed.

"We'll figure it out," she yawns, her lashes sweeping against the neck of his hospital gown when they fall shut. "All I know right now is that we need a break."

"Yeah," he murmurs, but he's never actually had a break before. "Sounds nice."

"So does sleep," she mumbles, pressing her lips to his shoulder through the thin fabric covering his skin. "Try to rest, Castle. You need it just as much as I do. Probably more."

He closes his eyes, but he doesn't sleep, listening to the even pattern of her breathing and relishing in the beat of her heart, the warmth of her frame against his side, and imagining seeing the world with Kate Beckett instead.


	19. Chapter 19

Castle is still asleep beside her the next time she wakes, his head tilted back against the hospital bed, his features at rest, and Kate sighs, travels the column of his throat with her gaze. She's in agony, pieces of her collarbone shattered, bone fragments like shrapnel embedded throughout her insides, but her pain is nothing compared to his.

Dr. Davidson had explained Rick's injury to her, how the armor-piercing round had struck his chest, broken through his sternum, a mere breath away from his heart. His recovery would be more strenuous than hers, but despite the visceral ache his body must be enduring, he had snuck out of his hospital room (three times, according to Davidson) and found his way to her (according to Ryan, who had been there when Castle had apparently collapsed at her bedside).

The lengths he would go to for her, the things he would do… it still scares her, sends a shiver of panic through her guts every time he looks at her with so much need shimmering in his eyes, so much trust and hope, love. No one has ever looked at her like that and she wonders if her eyes hold the same well of emotion every time her gaze finds him.

Kate tilts her head upwards, dusts her lips to the side of his throat, the reassuring throb of his pulse, and sighs in quiet contentment.

Castle stirs in his sleep, his body unable to shift towards her, but his face turns ever so slightly in her direction, seeking her even in slumber, and Beckett supports the minor change in angle with her forehead to his jaw, propping him up so not to put strain on his neck.

"Don't wake him up."

The voice from across the room has her body stiffening harshly, ready to startle, but she forces herself to remain still, not to jar both herself and the spy sleeping against her, and lifts only her eyes towards the man standing in the doorway.

Tall, broad upper body and a muscular build, white hair and familiar features, a vivid scar that runs from the top of his cheekbone to his jawline, and she knows who it is without having to ask.

Jackson Hunt. Castle's father.

"I have people stationed in this building," she warns, her voice low, weaker than she'd like, but it gets across the warning to the older man in the doorway, watching the two of them with his hands shoved in his coat pockets and curiosity gleaming in bright blue eyes she's seen before. But Hunt's aren't like Castle's, they don't glimmer with flecks of gold that emerge from within the sea of cerulean when he sees her, they don't remind her of the sky or the ocean. No, Hunt's are cold, a blue like the arctic with overlaid shards of ice and streaks of grey drowning the color out.

"Your two lackeys? Hardly a threat, Ms. Beckett-"

"Captain Beckett," she corrects him, tentatively maneuvering her body away from Castle's, enough for her to face his father head on without curling into Rick's side. "And it wasn't a threat, it's a fact. If you try anything, they'll end you before you can get out the door."

Hunt arches an eyebrow before he quirks his lips at her, amused. "You're quite confident for a woman laid up in a hospital bed with a bullet hole in her chest."

"Castle's the one with the chest wound, mine's less severe," she murmurs, narrowing her gaze on him as he draws the door shut behind him.

"I only close the door because I'd rather not have classified information overheard by the hospital staff, Captain," he assures her, but it brings Beckett no comfort. "I'm here to speak with my son, discuss what comes next for him."

"He doesn't want to go back," she says without thinking, a truth that isn't hers to tell, but with Castle out and vulnerable at her side, the urge to protect him rises hot and fierce within her damaged chest. Even if it's protection from his own father he requires.

"Forgive me if I could not care less about your opinion on the matter," Hunt drawls, leaning his back against the frame of the door. "And really, I expected more from you, Captain. You would be so selfish as to keep a man from returning to his life's work?"

"You mean _your_ life's work?" Beckett throws back and Hunt scoffs, but she forges on. "You didn't even consider how this mission would affect him, didn't care when he called you _asking for help_ , you just let Mason Wood kidnap us-"

"You. I let him kidnap _you_ , Beckett," Hunt growls, the barrier of his control cracking, his first real hint of agitation breaking through. "Because that is what was always going to happen. My son was requested to prolong the process, squeeze as much information as he could out of the stubborn but lonely captain of the Twelfth precinct who was on her way to the slaughter long before he even showed up."

Indignation flares through her chest, her gunshot wound catching fire. "Rick never would have gone along with the mission if he knew, if you'd given him all of the details-"

"My son is a trained agent and I am his handler. I handled the situation, the assignment, accordingly, I did my job, while he fell into a foolish trap of seduction-"

"It wasn't a trap, you asshole," she snaps, her heart pounding harder, her blood pulsing thick and fast through her veins. "He chose to stand with me and it was never for the sake of a mission. Falling in love was never a choice, but he chose that too, chose it over your dark deals-"

Hunt laughs, actually laughs at her greatest confession yet, and shakes his head incredulously. "You really think this thing between you two is _love_? You're just as naïve as he is."

"Then maybe it's just a perfect match," she bites back, curling her fingers around the forearm draped across her folded knees.

"What do you think you can offer him? A warm bed and a cozy little apartment downtown where he can wait for you to come home each night? You think a man who has spent his life traveling the world, making it a better place and serving this great country, will just settle for something so small and miniscule? For you?"

Insecurity spills through her system, unwelcome and unwarranted, exactly what Hunt wants and Kate grits her teeth, attempts to relax as she feels Castle's fingers flex at her thigh. She really doesn't want him waking up to her snarling at his father. If he isn't awake already, that is.

"I can offer him an actual life," she replies, returning her voice to a more neutral tone, lowering the volume of her words and inhaling a shallow breath to steady herself. "Options that go beyond playing James Bond for the rest of his life."

"That is a disgraceful comparison," Hunt dismisses with a wave of his hand. "And that's not what you want, is it, Kate? You're too independent, too stubborn, and desperate for death's door. You think my son wants a broken woman who has no will to change?"

Kate squares her jaw, her teeth grit so hard they threaten to grind and crack. "I've already changed."

"Captain Beckett, you really think you can turn off your obsessive behavior? Sure, it's dulled since you threw Bracken's ass in jail, but the second he was gone, you were chomping at the bit for a new rabbit hole to dive down," Hunt states, his lips twisting in a smile that makes her stomach turn. "You will never be happy with just him and he will never be happy with just you."

"You don't know that," she growls, tuning out Hunt's screwed up logic. She's changed, just in the last two months, she's changed so much. LokSat, the obsession that has always driven her since her mother's death hadn't died, but it had faded, made room for other things, for him. She's happier, she's better, and she can continue to be more for them both. "He can work with me at the Twelfth. He already has the skill set to-"

"That's the most absurd, mediocre proposition I have ever heard," Hunt laughs again, but his face forms a scowl in distaste. "I did not raise my boy to become a mockery, demoted to a desk job over a stupid woman."

Her chest trembles but Kate sits up straighter, breathes through the rage. "How dare you-"

"Whatever he's told you, whatever promises and sweet nothings he's whispered into your ear, will change once he is allowed some space and perspective. He has been stuck with you for nearly two months, doused in pain medication during his time here, but once his head is clear, darling, he will-"

Castle's fingers clench over her quadriceps muscle and Kate glances to her side, sees Rick Castle staring at his father with open eyes, all traces of light gone from the irises as they burn into the man across the room, momentarily strike him speechless.

She's only seen Castle appear so furious once before and that was three days ago, when he was strapped to a table about to watch her die.

"I'll what?" Castle picks up, his voice like gravel, his mouth in a grave slash carved into his skin as he awaits his father's response.

But if Hunt feels the least bit intimidated, he refuses to let it show. "You'll leave her. You'll come to your senses, realize where you belong, who you belong with, and that it isn't her."

"And you think that it's with you? With the CIA?" Castle retorts, a raspy, hollowed out chuckle accompanying his words. "You don't get it, Hunt. You think I'll leave her once my head is clear? But this is the first time I've felt clear headed in decades."

"Richard-"

"Whatever life Kate has to offer me is the one I'll choose. If this assignment hasn't proven that, then time eventually will."

Hunt rolls his eyes. "Less than two months, that's how long you've known her, and suddenly, you think you're living a fairytale like some fool."

Castle attempts a shrug and she can see the subtle wince it elicits, how it twitches through his features even as he tries to conceal it. "Really, I have you to thank for this. Pushing me to work with LokSat, to infiltrate Beckett's life. May have taken me longer to find her if you hadn't."

Hunt looks utterly repulsed as he glances back towards the door, reaches for the handle.

"We'll speak again when you're not attached to a woman and an IV drip," Hunt mutters, yanking the door open. "This isn't over, Richard."

"My answer won't change," Castle calls after him, but Hunt doesn't spare them another glance, stalking down the hallway until he's out of sight, and Kate drops her head back to Rick's shoulder.

"Wow, your father really is an ass."

"Tell me about it," he sighs, carefully drawing his hand back from her thigh, seeking hers and twining their fingers. "I woke up somewhere around you comparing me to James Bond, did I miss anything good?"

Kate represses her laughter, buries her smile in his shoulder instead. "No, nothing."

"Liar," he murmurs, his lips dusting along her hairline when he speaks. "Whatever he said to you, disregard it. Every word, Kate."

"I don't want to hold you back," she blurts, confesses one of the greatest fears his father had evoked in her, still a fresh seed of doubt the man had sprinkled water and fertilizer upon. "Don't let me do that, don't-"

"What do I have to do to prove that you do the exact opposite of that?" he inquires, sounding wholly untroubled by her concerns, and maybe it's just the pain medication still coursing through his system, or maybe he's truly has no doubts about her.

Whatever the reason, she envies him for it.

"We don't hold each other back, we won't," he murmurs, stroking his thumb in a circle over her knuckle, around and around, making her dizzy. "You're my partner, Beckett."

"I make you vulnerable," she argues softly, trapping his thumb with her own, squeezing his hand.

"Alright," Castle concedes, his chest rising with a tentative sigh, trembling on its fall back down. "But is it such a bad thing? To be vulnerable sometimes?"

"In the field-"

"Planning on accompanying me on a mission sometime soon, Captain?" he teases her, gently rolling his head towards her and arching his brow in question, but his expression is soft and his hand squeezes back. "Caring about people is a vulnerability in itself, but it's not a weakness. Loving you is a strength, Kate."

Kate buries her breath in his shoulder, squeezes her eyes shut and tries to silence the loop of Jackson Hunt's words through her skull, replace them with the lovely melody of Castle's instead. But she can't rid herself of the questions Hunt had planted in the garden of her uncertainty.

"And what if we don't work out?" she whispers. "What then?"

She doesn't have to look up to practically feel his frown, the ripple of disappointment through his veins, but she holds back her reassurances, needs to hear what he has to say. "Then we both move on, deal with the consequences. I'd probably end up moving to another country under a different identity, but I'd leave you hints to find me just in case you changed your mind-"

"A bit dramatic there, Rick," she chuckles, easing her forehead up from his shoulder, shifting back onto her side so she can see his face. "And what makes you think I'd be the one needing to reconsider?"

"Because I'd…" Castle pauses, purses his lips, and she gently nudges his outer thigh with his knee, tilting her head into her pillow in curiosity. "He has a point. It's only been two months and things can change, especially now that we have a chance to just be us, no mission behind anything."

"Yeah," she prompts, watching the furrow of his brow, the concentration that bleeds from his eyes to stretch his lips thin.

"So maybe it does sound premature to be so sure about you and me and this, but I just - am," he murmurs, managing a one-sided, self-deprecating little shrug of his shoulder. "There will never be a - I can't imagine having a reason to give you up, Kate. Like I told Hunt, time will prove that."

Kate exhales past the gravity of that statement, how sure he is, how much it continues to terrify her. He knows her but he doesn't, hasn't seen how she can be, how many relationships of her own that she's single-handedly destroyed.

"So you think I'd be the one to end this?" she asks, not defensive, not upset, simply wondering and taking opportunity of his honesty. He probably wouldn't be wrong. "Why?"

Castle shifts ever so slightly, his body loosening beneath hers, getting comfortable as he sinks back towards the sea of sleep. "I fell in love with you because you're different, extraordinary," he sighs softly, his eyes closing but the corner of his mouth twitching with affection. "There's nothing special about me, Beckett. Never gave anyone a reason to stay before, don't expect to now, but-"

"Castle," she rasps, her heart cracking wide, cleaved in two, because how the hell can he think that? "Rick, you're-"

"Shh, falling 'sleep, but I'm hopeful," he slurs, licking his lips. "Never was enough for anyone else, but none of them were you."

"No," she sighs, reclaiming the hand on her knee, careful not to jostle it, evoke any flickers of pain within his chest. "You're more than enough for me, Castle."

But he's already dozing against her.

* * *

She learned pretty quickly that Castle's loathing for hospitals matched - may even outdo - hers, that while he loved to take care of her, he hated others caring for him, hated relying on any form of dependency. But after a full seven days, they're both cleared and discharged, and she doesn't think she's ever seen him so eager to go.

"Not going to miss Doctor Davidson, Castle?" Ryan teases him, pushing Rick down the hall in the wheelchair he sits in with a pout that morphs into a scowl at the mention of their shared doctor's name.

"Ryan," she admonishes, shuffling along beside Castle's wheelchair with Esposito's hand clutching her elbow, the other hovering at her back, ready to catch her if she were to stumble.

Castle had told the boys the truth only two days prior to their release, after his dosage of pain medication had been significantly lowered and his head was clear. The men she loved like brothers had already figured it out – not that she had been surprised – but that hadn't stopped Esposito from ripping into Rick, calling him a traitor and threatening to add another week's worth of hospital stay for the betrayal until Kate had growled his name, told him that was enough.

Ryan, on the other hand, had accepted the news with dignity, expressed some minor disappointment over the lies, but had pointed out to his partner what really mattered. Castle had ultimately done the right thing, switched sides, saved her life. It hadn't been too difficult of a feat to quell Javi's anger towards him, especially after Ryan had reminded him of who the true traitor in their midst had been all along. Redirecting his fury onto Vikram was never much of a struggle.

"Don't worry, Beckett," Espo had assured her. "We're going to make that punk suffer."

Kate had been too tired to express her own quiet rage that she still harbored for the analyst who had posed as her temporary sidekick in her quest to conquer LokSat, the man who had lied to her all along, taken pleasure in it from what Castle had told her of his experience in working with the man.

But Rick was never silent when it came to his desire for vindication on those who had scorned her, his eyes like coals every time, black with jolts of electric blue crackling through his gaze as he had lifted it to meet Esposito's. "Good."

"Yo, we get to know where you guys are headed yet?" Esposito asks from Beckett's side, abandoning her for a second to push open the door to the hospital's back entry. A black SUV idles in the parking lot of the hospital, waiting for them.

"Once we get there," Castle assures Esposito with solemn eyes, still working to regain the man's trust, but the mutual respect was still there, gratitude for saved lives between the two of them. "We'll text you both. Can't disclose the location in public."

Esposito rolls his eyes, but grudgingly holds out his hand to Castle.

"Hurt her and you deal with us."

"You won't have to worry about that," Rick promises without hesitation as he accepts the grip of both Espo and Ryan's hands to haul himself to his feet. Her boys help him into the backseat of the van and Kate watches the transfer with her bottom lip between her teeth while Castle is strapped in, his face already white as a sheet with pain.

She accepts gentle hugs from both boys before she joins him, reminding Esposito to send Lanie her thanks for delivering her duffel bag of clothing earlier that morning, her best friend's packing apparently assisted by Castle and his brief explanation of the weather they'd be experiencing in this mystery location not even she knew the destination of yet.

"Call us if you need anything at all," Ryan quips after Beckett has slid in next to Castle, her body already threatening to tremble against his side from the minor bout of exertion. She already hates the healing process. "We'll gladly come to your rescue. Again."

"Yeah, you can count on us," Esposito adds, fist bumping Ryan before they ease the door shut.

Castle releases a quiet chuckle, but grits his teeth once the vehicle begins to move, a driver formerly from the CIA whom Rick swore they could trust gliding them out of the parking lot and into traffic. "This is going to be a long ride."

Beckett had never considered two and a half hours necessarily long, but with Castle repressing groans of agony while she bites back her own gasps of pain throughout every bump and turn and pothole, the drive to Rick's supposed safe house feels like it lasts a lifetime.

Eventually, the road begins to even out, the turns less sharp, the drive smoother, and Kate takes her first deep breath in over two hours. Castle, on the other hand, still appears as if he may pass out at any moment.

"Hey," she murmurs, calling for his attention as they encounter a town of shops and sand and the surrounding ocean in the near distance. The Hamptons.

Castle turns his head towards her with a slow breath, quirking the corner of his mouth for her, but it does little to dispel the spill of suffering through his eyes, and Kate strokes her thumb along the ivory bumps of his knuckles.

"I know I already explained to my dad, said goodbye to Lanie and the boys, but… is there anyone you should call? Any friends? Your - your mom?" she asks, genuinely curious, a little concerned. She had known the life of a spy had to be one of solitude, but the idea of him so isolated outside of the agency… it made her heart ache for him.

She watches Rick's lips part, no words falling free, before he purses them again, carefully shakes his head. "No. I don't - I don't have family, Kate. You knew that."

"But your mother, is she-"

"Europe," Castle answers, casting his gaze to the window, the blue skies and the sunshine overhead, leaking into the SUV to bathe his skin in warm light, lend some color to the pale quality of his flesh. "She's traveling through Europe right now. I haven't spoken to her in years, since… well, since I was around seven, I think. Last time I saw her before Hunt gained full custody. I did seek her out after that when I was in my twenties, found her pretty easily, but - my mother is happy. She's an actress on Broadway, she's in a serious relationship, she's got the life she wants and I'm happy for her."

Happy for her, but heartbroken too, his blue eyes sad and falling to his lap the moment he says it. The abandoned little boy emerging for just a second, consuming his face and cracking her heart along with his. What does it say to a child when the mother who gave him up moves on to live the life she wanted without him, doesn't seem to miss him from the outside looking in?

"And part of me loves her, what I can remember of her, and the best thing I can do for her is to stay away."

"Castle," she protests, but he squeezes her hand, glances towards her with eyes that plead for her to listen.

"I'm a spy, Kate. And even if that changes soon, I still have enemies, people that will kill anyone I'm close to. By staying away from her, I'm guaranteeing that she keeps her life. That's how I love my mother."

His explanation has her heart in her throat, choking her up and cursing Caleb Brown for robbing her of the ability to wrap her arms around Rick, hold him close until he doesn't look so broken. But she can't, can hardly move, so she works on using her words instead.

"That's not happening with me," she murmurs, her voice far more raspy than she would like, drenched in emotions she doesn't want, can't handle. Like all he's ever given her, love she never wanted but can't give up now that she has it. "You're keeping me close, Agent Castle."

The frown lines bracketing his mouth stretch, reviving some of those laugh lines that have joined the collection along his skin within the last couple of months. Castle smiles down at her, a lift of his lips that spreads to his eyes, sprinkles sparks of gold in amidst the softening blue of his irises that resemble the sight of the water glistening with sunlight just over his shoulder.

"No other choice," he admits, shifting his gaze to the window as they slow in front of an automated gate. The man enters a code that she knows Castle will change later, paranoid as he is, and then they're cruising down a paved driveway, towards a magnificent house that already has her breath catching.

"Rick," she calls before the mansion on the beach steals all of her attention, before the reality of their recovery sets in and her body catches on fire in the worst kind of way the second they have to dismount from the van.

He arches his eyebrow in question, his eyes falling to her mouth when she leans forward, as close as she can get without his help.

"Still partners."

It has to place strain on his chest wound, has to hurt, but Rick cranes his neck to brush a kiss to her lips, gentle and too soft, but she can taste the bloom of promise on his mouth, the reverent seal of a deal made against hers.

"Always, Beckett."


	20. Chapter 20

**Epilogue**

* * *

Beckett hadn't necessarily been surprised to learn that the safe house Castle had spoken of before their capture at his loft had been a massive house in the Hamptons, wasn't necessarily taken aback by the fact that throughout their three month stay in the beach home he had trained medical professionals on call at all times, a physical therapist he knew from "back in the day" who stopped by every week to work with them both until their bodies learned how to function without the constant assistance again.

It didn't surprise her when her dad took to Rick almost instantly after an awkward meeting that bloomed into a two-hour conversation on the deck of the lake a mere week after they return. She had been comfortable to let the two men talk without much of her input, lounging with her head on Rick's thigh and legs hanging off the edge of the dock, her toes in the cool water and the sun warming her skin.

Castle had told her dad the truth only three days into their week long stay at the cabin, a place she had wanted him to know, to experience, before she allowed him to sweep her away on this mystery vacation he's been planning since they had been released from the hospital. Rick had told him about his original profession, about the initial reason for meeting Kate, for working at the Twelfth, about LokSat and its conclusion – all information she had refrained from sharing with her father for the sake of his own safety.

"Katie told me you were both kidnapped and shot running down a lead for a simple case gone wrong," Jim had commented at the end of Castle's lengthy explanation, glaring at her for a long moment with that same expression he had always used on her when she was a child, after she'd done something to disappoint him.

"I couldn't risk you knowing, Dad. Couldn't risk you getting hurt," Kate had sighed, but Jim had only pursed his lips, shifted his gaze back to Castle.

"And what do you plan to do now, Rick?" Her father had questioned him like a lawyer in the courtroom, assessing him from across the kitchen table where they sat, the lunch on each of their plates hardly touched and going cold.

"I won't go back," Castle had stated with conviction, holding her father's eyes with his head held high. "I already put in my resignation."

"You did what?" Kate had whispered, her head turning a little too quickly, the still forming scar beneath her collarbone flickering with sparks of warning.

"I'm not sure what comes next for me, sir," Castle had continued, covering her knee with his palm beneath the table. "Not professionally, but I know for certain that my time as the agent that I was has come to a close."

Jim Beckett had leaned back in his chair, assessing Castle critically, but Kate had already been able to catch the telltale embers of approval in his eyes, tugging at the corners of his mouth. Her dad was pleased with the spy she had brought home, the man who had taken a literal bullet to the heart because of her.

And yet somehow, it surprised her when they had arrived at JFK just two days after parting ways with her dad and Castle led her to the waiting area for a flight that would be leaving to Pisa, Italy.

"Tuscany," Rick had stated before she could ask, nerves alive like flames in his eyes, trepidation consuming his entire face. "I rented us a place there that I really think you'll like, but if you _don't_ like it, if you'd rather have Rome or Paris or-"

"Castle," she had sighed, lifting her left arm, the limb that still possessed more freedom than her right, and coiling her fingers in the collar of his shirt, arching on her toes to reach his mouth as she tugged him towards her. He had breathed a sigh of relief into her kiss, a hum of approval at the languid stroke of her tongue. "I don't care where we go. I've never been to Tuscany, but I know I'll like it."

His lips had broken into a smile against hers and she'd closed her eyes, nudged her nose to brush with his.

"Like anywhere as long as you're there," she'd mumbled, her own smile blossoming as his arms had wound around her waist, his forehead knocking into hers before he had spoken.

"That is equally the most cheesiest and wonderful thing you have ever said to me."

Her eyes had fluttered open to find him trying not to laugh, but she did, burying her amusement against his jaw while she'd descended back to the soles of her feet. She'd never been one to dive so deeply into love with someone, to leave all of her doubts and reservations on the shore, but after LokSat, after the hospital and the Hamptons, her dad's cabin, she couldn't find many reasons to tread lightly with Castle anymore.

He made her happy, made her feel as if she had finally found something she's been lacking for so long; she'd found a home in him.

"Only for you, babe," Kate had chuckled, nipping at his chin when he lit up over the endearment, before drawing back, grateful for the lack of human traffic as she'd tugged him to a pair of chairs in the corner of the lounge to await their flight.

And now, after two weeks of lounging in the Italian paradise of their Tuscan Villa, Kate stretches in the empty bed, able to smell the rich blend of coffee he's preparing from the kitchen, and tries not to listen to the end of his phone call with the director.

Their time in Tuscany had been a vacation of sorts, yes, but she hadn't been able to completely avoid her work as Captain of the Twelfth and despite his talk of resignation, Castle had been unable to cut his ties to the CIA so easily. She returns to the precinct to resume her role in just a week, but she has no idea what Rick's future looks like, and it has doubts that she has spent the last four months smothering threatening to bloom once more.

"Hey, you're awake."

Kate averts her eyes from the window that overlooks the sprawling green hills below the one their villa is perched upon, the vineyard in the distance that they'd visited last week, the glittering turquoise of the infinity pool outside that offers a brilliant view of the stunning scenery. She's no longer surprised that he manages to enter the room without her notice; he may have taken a break from being a spy, but he had yet to lose the stealth factor. Not even close.

Beckett's lips quirk upwards at the sight of him standing in the bedroom doorway, the two cups of coffee in his hands emitting swirls of steam that spiral skywards to caress his jaw like the golden rays of sunlight spilling in from the window.

"Hey," she murmurs, pushing up on her elbows and running a hand through the tousled waves of her hair as he approaches. "How long have you been up?"

"Phone woke me an hour ago," he explains, offering up one of the brightly colored mugs to her and Kate curls her knees up to her chest, rests her back against the headboard while Castle takes a seat near her feet.

She tucks her toes under his thigh, watches his hand slip beneath the edge of the sheet to encircle her bare ankle in his fingers.

"Give me the verdict," she prompts, wiggling her toes and bracing her heart. There's no reason to be nervous, to feel as if their relationship could hinge on whatever decision he's come to, and even if it did, it wasn't like she _needed_ him around 24/7 to make them work. She just… she's happy. She's so happy. And she doesn't want that to change. "The anticipation's killing me."

Rick sighs, but the corners of his mouth are curling ever so slightly. "I worked out a deal with the director."

She bites her bottom lip, the sear of the ceramic cup burning through the sheet across her chest as she leans forward, silently encourages him to continue.

"I'm not leaving the agency, but I'll no longer be working under my father," he starts and Kate nods along, liking this deal so far, but he isn't done yet and she holds her breath. "And instead of accepting missions, I'll be overseeing them. From the office in New York."

She lifts one set of her fingers to the tentative smile claiming her lips, mimicking the one spreading across his.

"You're going to be full time in New York?" she clarifies, placing her coffee mug on the bedside table, watching him do the same while her heart flutters in her chest, the repaired wings of it beating hard against the cage of her ribs.

"I'll probably occasionally have to go abroad, but ultimately, I'll be in New York full time. You okay with that, Beckett?" he smirks, holding his coffee out to the side when she rises on her knees, crawls towards him until she can cup his face in her hands, smudge her smile to his mouth.

Castle huffs a laugh into her kiss, his unrestrained hand gliding up the naked line of her back, his palm curving at her nape, fingers curling in her hair. She's a little too okay with it, if she's being honest with herself.

"I can live with it," she mumbles, teasing his bottom lip between her teeth, chuckling low in her throat when he bends sideways to deposit his coffee to the floor, band both of his arms around her.

Castle skates his hands along the expanding branches of her ribs, caresses the curves of her waist before he brackets her bare hips in his palms, squeezes the naked skin of her lower back beneath his fingers. "Not sick of me yet?"

She should be, she thinks. So much time spent with any other man, any other human being really, and she'd have lost her mind by now, she's sure of it, but with Castle… he's different. No secret there. He's been unique from the start, and all of her rules, her precautions and doubts when it came to letting people in, had all fallen by the wayside in favor of embracing this foreign thing between them that had bloomed into something beautiful.

He is the one exception to her every rule and arguably, the most reassuring thing about that is how she knows she meets the same criteria for him. Her relationship with Rick, the connection they had developed early on, varied fiercely from any other she's ever known, had been strong enough to survive secrets and betrayals, a near death experience that had only strengthened the bond between them.

"No," she murmurs, one of her hands trickling down the side of his throat, straying to her fingers' favorite spot atop his chest, the raised flesh of a bullet scar, still puckered and red but smooth beneath the whorls of her fingertips.

She wasn't sick of him, no. Not when it still felt as if they were only in the early chapters of what would be a lifelong story.

Damn, Castle's sappiness had really rubbed off on her in the last few months.

Rick brushes his thumb to the matching scar beneath her collarbone, reminding her to stop babying his bullet wound, and Kate sighs, drops her hand with one last swipe of her thumb to the healed injury that tugs at her own scars, like a phantom cord of connection between them.

"Have you thought more about my proposition?" he quips, gliding the hand rubbing her scar upwards, dipping his thumb into the hollow of her throat.

Beckett hums, sits back on her heels in the bed and stretches for her coffee before it goes completely cold. "The apartment on Broome?"

" _Brownstone_ ," he corrects, watching with pleased delight as she takes a sip of the dark, rich liquid still hot in her mug, savors the rush of the coffee down her throat, spreading warmth through her chest. "The one near Greenwich is my favorite, but we can keep looking if you want, find one you prefer."

"No, I agree. The one you picked out is gorgeous," she murmurs around the rim of her mug, trying not to meet the expectant eyes resting on her, the nervous smile he valiantly tries to pass off as casual.

"And I mean - we don't have to put down an offer right away if you don't want to. If you're even interested, that is. We can just - well, no, _I_ can get a place. A studio or something and when you're ready we can-"

"Castle."

Rick lifts a supplicating hand between them and she purses her lips, mostly in amusement, because he's so obviously distraught over an answer she has yet to even give. "Look, I know we've spent the last three and a half months living together and I can drive you crazy in the not so great ways-"

Kate snorts a laugh into her cup and rolls her eyes, because yeah, he could get on her nerves, spike her irritation at times, but overall? Living with him had been… nice, a natural and easy adjustment, as if they'd been doing it far longer than the few weeks she'd spent with him in the loft, those three months in the Hamptons.

"And I get if you want your space back, at least for a little while, but I just - I don't want space from you."

She doesn't speak yet. He's wearing that thoughtful expression that often claims his face when his emotions are working to untangle, revealing realizations that rise to his mouth before he can stop them, and she wants to hear the one currently brewing on the tip of his tongue.

"We can do this however you want, all I know is - you're my home, Beckett. And I'll take you however I can get you."

She expects her heart to stop, startle with the kind of anxiety that often invades her system when she feels unprepared, overwhelmed, but her chest doesn't seize, doesn't flush with panic. Her heart doesn't stumble, it swells, settles in a warmth that wraps around the muscle, embraces it with certainty.

Kate returns her cup to the bedside table, replaces the heat of her mug with the warmth of his hand in hers, her thumb absentmindedly stroking the naked length of his fourth finger.

She's certain of him, of what she wants. More than ever before.

"Put down an offer," she murmurs, watching hand flip in hers, his palm colliding with hers and his fingers twining through, his thumb mimicking and grazing her ring finger.

"You know what this means, don't you?"

"That I'm going to have to get used to you driving me crazy in non-sexual ways on a daily basis?" she muses, finally lifting her gaze to find the bright blue eyes sparkling back at her, promising her things before his lips can speak them.

"Yes, but - I'm going to marry you, Kate Beckett," he states with more confidence than she thinks she's ever heard from him, and she curves one of her eyebrows in response, waits for him to continue, because he always has more to say these days. "And I'm going to do everything in my power to make you happy, give you everything you deserve."

"You already do," she mumbles, pinning her bottom lip between her teeth and tugging gently on his hand until he's shifting closer, close enough for her to dust her fingers at his nape, toy with the fine hairs at the base of his skull. "Make me happy. Happier than I've been in a long time, Castle," she admits, the glimpse of her mother's smile flashing behind her eyes. The last time she was truly happy.

Her mom would absolutely love him, adore the idea of having him for a son-in-law.

"Are you proposing, Rick?"

"No," he replies, brushing a kiss to her forehead, where she can feel his lips curl into a smile against her skin. "But I'm going to."

Kate grins and dislodges the pressure of his mouth to nudge her nose along the plane of his cheek, inhale the comforting scent of him, of coffee beans and sun kissed skin, of mint and wood and refuge, and fit her body deeper into his side.

Never has she been so effortlessly in sync with another person, so easily aligned. They were the same in certain aspects, but as different as night and day in others, puzzle pieces with jagged edges and odd angles that somehow managed to slot into place perfectly. She wants it all with this man, the spy sent to lead her to the slaughter, led her to a home she hadn't known she'd been searching for instead.

"I'll say yes."

* * *

 **A/N: I owe an infinite amount of gratitude to Alex, for being my second pair of eyes on this story and offering so much fantastic input, and to Nadia, for creating the striking cover art to accompany this fic. And to all who took the time to read and offer feedback - I sincerely thank you. I hope you enjoyed this little adventure of a story as much as I enjoyed sharing it with you.**


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